Trauma in Sedona Part VI--Detroit Airport 1996 Redux

We came upon a clearing and dug in to the rich offerings that were bursting the seams of my backpack. How much string cheese can one man enjoy? For my money, there is no limit to the pleasure one gets from ripping into a miniaturized tube of mozzarella and pulling long strands off like it was a maypole. As much as I was craving that homogenized goodness, I resisted the urge and allowed my ailing mother and children load up on the calcium-rich treats. Apparently, Joany was denied the delights of the juice box, and has not yet gotten over it, but the kids drank down their fruity beverages and the down time allowed Shari's heart to somehow overcome the near tragedies that we had all just experienced. She was still uttering nothing but monosyllabic words (mixed in with an occasional Savannah), but her vocabulary had reached at least 20 words at this point, and we all felt strongly that she was well on her way to a full recovery from witnessing her rat pack try to end their lives within seconds of one another.
We decided to follow the path in the opposite direction from our normal hikes and were happy to discover that the creek cut up that way as well. As an added bonus, there was still quite a bit of snow on the creek bed in this direction because it was not exposed to as much sunlight as we were along our usual walk. This of course did not change the fact that the floppy hat stayed firmly affixed on Gramma G's skull the entire time. The kids made a few snowballs, Abby wandered down to the white oddity and we found a place to walk back across the creek. Fortunately, at this "more travelled" part of the hike, there were enough rocks to keep our feet safely above the surface of the menacing creek. Joany and Gramma G utilized the walking sticks that they had acquired and were able to get to the other side without incident. We walked another couple of hundred yards and decided that it was probably as good a time as any to return from whence we came.
Lauren grabbed onto my throat for dear life and we trudged back along the sandy path over the creek, past the refueling area, through the ruins, over the spooky walking bridge and back to the still overcrowded parking lot. The dogs were fully leashed for the remainder of the journey and as we got back to the car, the need for nourishment came up again. Surprisingly the vast amounts of string cheese that were consumed by all in attendance did not have the desired effect and our hunger was far from placated. We decided that we would find some place to stop and would try to leave the dog and rats in the car while we dined. There is a first time for everything. We piled into the cars and with the Endeavor in tow, we headed out of the park back down the winding road. Within a couple of miles, we came upon a campground or motel or something of the sort and it appeared that they had a dining room with outdoor tables open. I pulled into the parking lot and Shari followed. She was still muttering, but she had gotten her senses back and was showing outward signs of rational thought. It had been at least 15 minutes since any of us had heard any of the classic nine as they came to be known (My, Oh, heart, Savannah, God, I, breathe, my, can't--I realize now that she was utilizing the "my" twice in her utterances, but at the emotional state she had fallen to, I gave her full credit for nine words--I'm pretty generous in such things), so we put the rats into the Caravan to enjoy a little quality time with Abby. We cracked a couple of windows, so that their howls, yips and barks could resonate throughout the canyon and be enjoyed by all.
We sat down on the patio and enjoyed a relatively stress-free lunch. It wasn't too bad considering it was some roadside dump. I think it was called Junipine or some facsimile thereof, and aside from a somewhat challenged server, we got about 45 minutes of freedom from the rats and they were either being a hell of a lot quieter than I would have given them credit, or they had fallen asleep. Either way, we were uninterrupted, fat and happy. It appeared that life was returning to normalcy. Gramma G and Joany wanted to stop by one of the Arizona cheeseball souvineer shops that dot the landscape. We passed the megaplex that is known as Tlaquepaque--there is one in Phoenix, so I didn't see the need to stop there, and we continued down the road until we came upon a souvineer shop that we could be proud of. Plenty of crap strewn about in every direction over about two acres. There was also an endless supply of cool items, and we had stopped here the last time in Sedona with Meemaw and Poppy Joe when we spent about six and a half hours going through every corner of both acres before settling on a Metallic Lizard and small bracelet. You try entertaining Lauren that entire time while not allowing her to touch any of the 4 billion trinkets and whatnots strewn about the place. Let me promise you that it is no picnic. There is only so much fascination one can derive from an old Army-issued combat helmet that has been adorned with scrap metal to create a turtle statuette--and they say that art is dead.
We pulled off the road behind the store and I quickly realized that we were going to get blocked in, so I pulled the Caravan forward and parked right outside the entrance. Shari parked the Endeavor where we had originally parked (about 30 yards back). I turned the engine off and Kim said that she and the kids were going to stay in the car. After my last experience trying my damndest to keep an eye on Lauren, I was in no mood to argue. I looked in the side mirror and caught some strange activity in the road which had brought traffic to an absolute standstill in both directions. Thank god we got here when we did. Nothing worse than being stuck in traffic.
"Kaaaaaaay-LEEEE! AAAAAAAAIIIIIGGGGGGH! STOP-STOP-STOP!!! EEEEEEEEEEEE!!
oh my God. Stop! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!! KAY-LEEEEE! AAAAAEEEEEEAAAAAIIIIIGGH!" I am quickly running out of letters here, but the noise that was coming from coincidentally about 30 yards back was piercing, frightening and insane. Running into and out of traffic was the rat--under tires, behind truck beds, through Shari's legs and under bumpers and trailer hitches. Confused, Frightened and flying about with the reckless abandon of a freshman from an all-girls Catholic College on her first Spring Break in Cancun, Kaylee had Shari running about like her body had been invaded (not by Poppy Joe this time) by a rabid seal in the unrelenting grips of an ether binge. It was unlike anything I had ever seen--I swear it. It was truly the most bizzarre display of human paranoia unleashed this side of Nurse Ratchett's most deeply disturbed subjects.
While a part of me wanted to help, I was paralyzed by a couple things. First, there was the real fear of actually being associated with this obvious psychopath. I didn't know any of these people, but when one of them called this one in, the authorities would certainly take everybody involved down to Belleview for a mild sedative and a chat with the boys. Secondly, there was an absolutely rational fear of being attacked by this lunatic as I approached, because she would have perceived me to be a threat to the rat. Rabid seals on ether binges are not exactly known for their predictability or ther rational thought. Thirdly, like the guys in the truck next to us who were laughing their asses off, it was one hell of a show, and I was not one to interrupt somebody else's fun. Being somewhat removed from the situation, what was the real danger once Shari had stopped traffic with the high pitched insanity? Kaylee was going to run at full speed into a parked hubcap? She might have been knocked silly, but there was no real danger. But even with the traffic halted 1/4 mile in each direction, Shari carried on like she had an entire Scorpion colony trapped in her miles of hair.
Kim prodded me on to help her. "Josh--help her!"
Still frozen with fear and amusement, I forced my legs to make their way back to Shari and the rat. She was still digging under the engine block of a Subaru for the little ball of fluff, but by the time I got to her, she had ripped the freak back out from under the Outback and was clutching her and babbling nonsensically.
"Oh my God--My Heart. I can't-I can't--my heart--I can't-- Oh My God"
Here we go again and this time she can't even say the word breathe. I walked over to her on the side of the road and told her to calm down that she was acting like a freak. In retrospect, this probably wasn't exactly the kind of empathy she was looking for in her moment of need. She was completely emotionally spent over the potential loss of both of her dogs over a two hour period. Realizing full well that she only had two dogs, but they had tried to kill themselves three times since Gramma G traversed the stunt log in what must have seemed like it was several years ago. They tempted fate enough in one afternoon that I wasn't sure she would ever make it back from the emotional abyss in which she found herself fully entrenched. And here I was mocking her just because her seal act was so convincing. Great, now I'm the bad guy--see how that works.
In the grand scheme of things, today was all about karma. You heard me right--karma. Nearly ten years ago, I experienced what can only be described as the kind of cruel torture best reserved for the finest Al-Quada operatives we can find. While travelling back from Dan's wedding in Scotland without his wife because of some sort of Visa problem, we had a three hour layover in Detriot's Airport after spending about 16 hours getting to that point. We decided to call Gramma and Grampa G to let them know that we had made it back to the states safely--you know, check in because they might be worried. They had been charged with the task of dogsitting Shari's first rat, Midori while we were away. After 16 hours of travelling, and with a three hour layover and a four hour flight still on the horizon, they decide that now would be an ideal time to mention to me that Midori had made her way out of the backyard and was no longer with us. I told them that there could not be a worse time to tell Shari this, but they felt like it would be better coming from me. I told them that there was no freaking way I was going to tell her--not today--not right now. They decided at that moment that they would have to tell her.
As I watched all of the color leave her face and witnessed the transformation in to blubbering hellchild, I knew that I would never forgive my parents. The next 10 hours of my life have to be among the worst I had ever experienced. Dan managed to get a seat 15 rows behind us, but the quiverring mess that was my sister was tethered to my side for every minute of that Northwest flight. She was heaped in a corner as I tried to get a hold of my future wife who had my car and was suddenly unable to meet us at the airport. In the shuttle ride to Kim's restaurant to retrieve my car, she sobbed uncontrollably. And on that 90 minute drive up to Ma's house in Ocala, she wept, sighed softly, bawled and muttered. On one side, I've got my best friend having to leave his wife of 10 days for the next six months because of a silly form being filled out improperly, and just behind me in the back, I've got my sister visiting the depths of despair that I didn't know could exist over a two pound ferret. There was no escaping it and my parents should have been forced to endure just one iota of that 26 hours of pure hell.
On this day on a 90 minute drive home from Sedona, Gramma G got her thimble full of my own personal torture chamber. Somewhere out there, Dan is smiling and I now know that Grampa G will get his too. Joany didn't really deserve that drive home from Sedona with whatever was left of Shari's psyche, but she chose to hang out with somebody who had this Karma attack coming, and she should have realized the risk going in. Shari's karma comes from the fact that she brought the rats in the first place--I tried to discourage her, I tried to dissuade her, I tried to flat-out tell her that it was a bad idea to bring rats to Sedona. She chose to ignore that advice and the near death on three occasions of one of the members of the rat brigade was her penance. Looking back, I'm kind of glad she brought them. Rarely has an outing to Sedona brought so much entertainment value to our family. Besides, the rats had so much fun.
So what did we learn? First and foremost, we learned that Rats have no business anywhere near Sedona, creeks, rocks, water, traffic or among decent society. Second, we learned that getting started on a posting like this one should never happen again--Six freaking parts--Is anybody out there actually still reading this crap? Third, never post any topic about dogs again--I think I have six out of the last seven postings with a picture of a dog. People are going to start to think this is a PETA friendly site (which it is not--you PETA freaks, stay the hell away--I am testing every chemical in my house in bunnies eyes right now). Fourth, Shari needs to get bigger dogs, period. And finally fifth, it is better to leave any and all family members at home when we go to Sedona. We bring Meemaw and she tries to drown our daughter (or at least crack her skull open on a rock); we bring Kim's Dad and Carol up and those poor saps end up getting married; Khris and Christy endured the same tragic fate; and now when we bring Shari, Joany and Gramma G, I end up with that goofy-assed picture on my blog. Life has a sick twisted sense of humor.

Trauma in Sedona Part V--Drowned Rats and Suicide Pacts

Sure enough, as Savannah was exploring the rocks on the left side of the pool like some sort of Mountain Goat, Kaylee continued to follow Hunter and Abby around as though she was actually an animal of substance and not an overactive member of the rodent family. As she scurried about the rocks and sand, she attempted to jump the substantial pool of water to get to the side that Savannah was on and she sort of missed the attempted landing spot. Missed might be a bit of an exaggeration. She tried to shoot a three pointer from midcourt and landed at the top of the arc. Though she never had a chance to clear the pool, at least she could have gotten close enough to hit the rim. Not this time--splash down into the frozen muck, somewhat reminiscent of Meemaw dropping Lauren a few months back, but somewhat different this time. She looked like a cotton ball attached to a drowning moth as it went down in a toilet bowl. As entertaining as it may have been to watch, soon Shari realized that her rat was not in plain sight and Kim made some comment like "Oh, my God--Kaylee! Kaylee!"
This was followed by Shari panicking as though her first born was trapped in that snake pit from Raiders of the Lost Ark. The grunting and squirming as she kept making her way to the slick rocks and I started to feel badly for the rat. No matter how insignificant in size she might be, it is tough to watch an animal suffering like that, and as yippy as she can be, I didn't want to see her drown in a toilet bowl sized puddle--not today anyway. Kim screamed at me, "Josh, get her out! Josh!" I reached down and grabbed a hold of her and she let out a yelp like she was having her testicles pinched by a vice grip (realizing full well, she has no testicles--I just can't recall a sound like that one made by any mammal that wasn't involving severe distress of one's nards). So I get blamed for hurting her at this point--freakin' rat. Should have let the cotton balled moth go down. As her drowned pelt scurried around the terra firma, Hunter was busy chasing Savannah down as she ascended Everest.
By this time, things were getting out of hand. Shari was just starting to calm down to the point that she could understand monosyllabic words spoken very slowly. Savannah climbed to the top of the large boulder formation and looked down at all the excitement. She was glowing with the success of reaching the summit of such an incredibly substantial hill--she must have been 10, maybe even 11 feet high (according to later accounts of the story, I heard that she was at least 5 stories high). She stopped there for a moment to pose for a photo-op as Hunter chased her down from behind. My cries of "Hunter, get your butt back here!" were to no avail. He pursued Savannah like a jealous husband finding his wife's car and his best friend's car parked next to each other at the Super 8 on some abandoned stretch of highway. There was to be no stopping him.
Savannah must have heard the commotion down below and had no intention of taking the long way home, not when everybody was so close. Before anybody could even realize what was going on, she pushed off with all of the beagleness she could muster and after propelling herself about a foot and a half out to a ledge of rocks just below her take-off point, her gigantic ears were not able to sustain the Dumbo-like results she was expecting and her flight that showed so much promise on take-off turned out to be (to quote Les Nesman of WKRP fame) plummoting to the earth like a giant sack of wet cement. Oh the humanity, indeed. Shari still shell-shocked from Kaylee's near drowning was now paralyzed with uncontrollable panic. "Oh my God! Oh my God! Savannah! Oh my God! Oh my God! Savannah!!!! Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God! Savannah! Oh my God!" Aparently she had been reduced to these prominent (but relatively useless in most situations) four words of the English language.
She ran over to find the rat buried up to her stomach as her legs disappeared into the soft earth below the rocks. Suddenly a quadraplegic rodent, she had become a weiner dog in every sense of the word. She let out a grunt of some sort and we weren't really sure what to make of the whole scene. Had she landed two feet in any direction, she would have broken at least a couple of legs and probably killed herself. Instead, she got the wind knocked out of her and looked like a freaking daredevil. She was the envy of every NY City sewer rat--she had done her breed proud, but this was of no consolation to Shari. "Oh my God! I can't breathe. Oh my God! Oh my God! Savannah, I can't breathe."
Kim at this point after realizing that Savannah was going to live started laughing uncontrollably. She was doubled over nearly peeing herself. I was looking around for a McDonalds cup for her, but there were none around. Oh well, the van already smelled like urine, what difference would a soaked pair of Jeans make in my life? Shari held Savannah and kept muttering, "Oh my God! I can't breathe. My heart. Oh my God, my heart. Savannah, Oh my God, I can't breathe." At least now she was up to 9 words, but she didn't look any better than she had. Joany started asking about the string cheese again and I realized that we better forage ahead. The challenge now was that we had to cross back over the way we came. There was no freaking way Gramma G and Joany were going to cross that treacherous log again. Not after the carnage we just witnessed. I walked up to the left and surveyed the creek to see if there was a better place to cross that wouldn't involve such a necessity of coordination and balance. There was a spot to cross, but we would be forced to immerse the bottoms of our shoes in the water at a couple of spots. The fear that gripped Gramma G and Joany was somewhat understated compared to the paralysis that Shari still found herself under, but neither was looking forward to crossing those rolicking waters. Hunter jumped right out there and his pants were now drenched up to the thighs--never happier by the way. I played Scout master and led the two crazy ladies reluctantly, but safely to the other side. Shari, still mired in a catatonic state, followed Kim across. She may have been to consumed with muttering those nine words that she didn't recognize the obvious dangers in crossing the riptide without a harness, but before we knew it, we popped out on the other side to the safety of the sandy path.
The treachery and doom of this day was far from finished, however and as we all took delight in the delicacies of juice boxes and string cheese, no one could possibly anticipate what still awaited us.
Editor's Note: You may notice that there are two postings from today. If you are completely lost at this point, you probably missed part IV just below. I will not be able to write tomorrow morning, so the final installment of this adventure will not be posted until tomorrow (Wednesday). Sorry for the confusion and hope that you are enjoying the ride.

Trauma in Sedona Part IV--Dem Crazy Old Broads

Slowly but surely, cars started to pull out of the parking lot and the line trudged forward until we finally got to the Ranger booth. She was very nice and understanding of our plight. There were a couple of very tight spaces that she had sent the car in front of us to explore and she offered us the chance to try to squeeze in. I explained that the yipping that was coming from the car behind us belonged to us as well and unless we could find two spaces, we would probably be right back. We paid the $7 entry fee and sought a parking spot that would sustain the awesome nature of the Caravan. As we jammed ourselves between a White Tundra and some kind of Chevy Aveo looking thing, five cars pulled out simultaneously--those bastards. We were already parked and the kids and Abby were bouncing off the seats trying to escape the urine scented coccoon that we had found ourselves trapped in for far too long.
We dragged the gang over to Shari's SUV as they filtered out as though their creaky bones could barely sustain stepping down after their arduous drive. The rats were tethered to their leashes and were ferreting about in every possible direction. Abby was going insane as she could smell and hear the rustling water below. At this moment as Abby worked to yank my shoulder out of socket trying to at last get to the creek, everybody decided that we needed to have a bathroom break. For what seemed like an eternity, everybody made their way into the giant holes with toilet seats attached and relieved themselves. Mom slapped on the giant red floppy hat--I can only assume that she had slathered any exposed skin in SPF 200 in the car because I didn't see her rubbing it into her skin in the parking lot. You can only imagine the horror of walking beneath the shade of the trees and canyon and leaving a square inch of skin exposed. Someday scientists are going to find out that rubbing excessive amounts of sunscreen on one's skin will cause liver failure and then she'll be completely screwed. This always happens, by the way. You may as well enjoy your life, eat whatever the hell you want, drink and smoke whatever you want, because the things that supplant what you aren't supposed to enjoy ultimately end up killing you, but just in a different fashion. Take alcohol for example--yes it may cause psorosis of the liver (you can spell check that one for me later), but drinking it in moderation is actually healthy for you and leads to a longer, happier life with less stress. Red wine even aids in digestion, so do what you're going to do, just so long as it makes you happy. For the time being, sunscreen and floppy hats makes Gramma G happy, so who are we to question how silly she looks?
Abby could not be controlled and she bolted down the trailhead as if she had just spotted a Rawhide bone the size of an elephant. The rest of the gang followed back 30 yards or so as we made our way over the bridge. Our general walk goes over this walking bridge and then we head down to the left where the creek runs for a couple of miles. We usually walk about a mile down over a rocky shore and sometimes out into the water over paths of rocks jutting out above the surface. Abby splashes her way around and the kids end up soaked from head to toe, because they cannot resist walking through the frozen water. With our troop today, there was a better than average chance that some or all of our guests would not be able to travel down our usual path, but until they bailed, Abby was determined to lead them along our usual journey.
We walked down the path about 100 yards from the end of the bridge and headed down through the brush to the creek where as luck would have it, there were no other people at this moment. As I tried to make my way downhill over the slippery rocks, Abby was huffing a puffing and doing her best to upend me. As I took one more look over the landscape, I decided to remove the leash and let her run free. As Shari caught up, she let the rats run free as well. Hunter, as always was doing just great. He jumped from puddle to puddle, pretending to try to stay dry for about 10 seconds before immersing himself whenever and wherever possible. Kim was carrying Lauren, but she got down as well and splashed around as much as she could before she was exhausted and needed to be carried again. The rats set out to follow Abby, who was absolutely in her glory. Kim appreciated being freed from carrying Lauren, if only for a moment and did her best to encourage the rest of our entourage (wow, did you ever realize how closely encourage and entourage are spelled. I don't know if I have ever used them in the same sentence--certainly not that close together, but it is really just the difference between a c and a t--who knew? All right--Captain Boggle in DC, I am sure that you knew, but did anybody else?) The bitching and whining started up relatively quickly.
"Are you sure you know where you're going?"
"I don't know if I feel comfortable on these rocks."
"This sure is slippery, I don't know if your mother and I should walk over here."
"How do we get down there?"
"Can we go back to the path now?"
"This is nuts--I don't want to break my arm again."
"Can we have some of that string cheese now?"
It never ended. For somebody who read The Little Engine That Could to her kids as often as she claims, Joany sure didn't get the message of the book, and Gramma G must never have liked that story. The three of them veered us back to the path for a moment and we walked along the sandy path with the dogs back in their harnesses for a few minutes. We convinced them to allow us to return back to the creek when we got to the remains of the old buildings that looked like they had been destroyed by a fire 100 years ago--nobody has ever actually researched the history of this area, so we can only guess what happened, but I try to make up something different every time for the kids--a different style of revisionist history if you will. So before they could work up the energy to fill the air with their hollow and empty protests, we were back down to the creek with the dogs back off their leashes and the kids back in the water up to their ankles. I am not saying that it was necessarily an easy part of the walk. The water was higher than usual. The rocks were quite slippery and rounded, making it difficult to get a good grip with your shoes. The walk forces you to take larger than usual steps in some areas, and occasionally, the soles of your shoes might get moistened, but that is part of the fun.
Gramma G walks about 65 miles a day. There had to be moments on some of these walks where the pavement came to an end, but watching the two of them trying to traverse the simplest of obstacles was like watching a wounded, mentally challenged, hopelessly uncoordinated and awkward 6 month old trying to take her first steps--you want to do your best to help them along and watch them succeed, but deep down, you know that only heartache and pain are around the corner. The bitching continued as they came to each opportunity. Abby kept looking back with that "You gotta be freaking kidding me" look on her face. Shari did her best to keep up and did a relatively good job (certainly better than the Crazy ladies). She was just so excited to see her rats having made it this far without drowning that I don't think she recognized the obvious peril that Joany and Gramma G took great pleasure in pointing out.
We finally got to a point that they had to cross over a 8 foot log that was somewhat wobbly. Realizing that if they slipped off one side or the other, they very well could have wound up with wet shoes or (perish the thought) wet calves, their fear was certainly justified. Kim, Lauren, Hunter and Shari made it across without too much acrimony, but the Old Lady and her four year junior cousin (that was for you Joany--don't expect too much more of that sucking up, because I'm not so good at it.) looked at the log with absolute horror. You would have thought that I was asking them to bungee jump off of Niagara Falls and they both just stood there frozen with fear. I tried to hand a walking stick back to Joany, but she didn't dare reach across the great crevace that faced her. Instead, I walked back across with the walking stick brought it to her and steadied the log with my feet while cheering her across the log that Evil Knievel himself would be reticent to traverse. She managed to make it without incident and handed the stick back to me. I handed it to Gramma G and my confused, paralyzed, floppy hat wearing mother (doubting her sanity and swearing like a sailor the whole way) put one foot in front of the other and made her way to the other side. Her stomach in knots, her hair standing on end, and only the brim of that floppy red hat providing her with the balance that she needed to persevere, she found herself on solid ground on the far side of the log.
After a moment to catch our collective breath, I walked over to the far side of the rocks. This is a point in the walk where we generally have a couple of choices on which way to go. There was a set of large boulders to our right, where Hunter had managed to climb. Just past the rocks was a pretty deep pool of water that had been formed from the melting snow and rain from the past week. On the left was another set of boulders that was about 10 feet high. The dog and rats were going crazy, wanting to press on. Kaylee was trying to follow Hunter, Savannah was climbing rocks like a freak, and Abby was running back and forth between all of them to find out where the best fun might be derived. The frenetic nature of all the animals, children, and crazy old ladies moving in so many directions was starting to create challenges. It became quickly apparent that we could not move past this point on our walk because of all the water that had accumulated, so I tried to herd everbody back toward the sandy path. Getting everybody to listen to me at this moment proved to be easier said than done and as the people began to gather in one location, the sound of a splash, a high-pitched yip and claws frantically scratching for the rocks suddenly made me turn my head.

Trauma in Sedona Part III--Arrival into Womanhood

For a family outing, Sedona is just about the perfect distance from our house. It takes a little over an hour to get to the Oak Creek/Sedona area and another 20-30 minutes to get to our hiking spot. The drive is absolutely magnificent, but at the same time it can be quite treacherous as well. Lots of sharp turns, lots of beautiful scenery to look at and lots of tourists, lost and confused as they try to find the Pink Jeep Tours office. Leaving the North Phoenix area, you immediately begin your ascent into the mountains. Five minutes north of our house, you are at 2000 feet elevation and before you can think about your ears popping, you find yourself at 6000 feet. The grade is very steep and generally the car gets incredibly upset when you lock in the cruise control at 80mph and try to coerce the engine to do its job. When I had the Saturn, this was especially noticeable and there were two or three distinct climbs where I knew the car would recoil in horror and jump up to about 7000 rpms before forcing me to reassess my strategy and push that badboy to 50mph and pray. Nothing like starting a road trip (no matter how long or short) with the family stranded by the side of the road around a blind turn in the middle of nowhere. The Saturn never completely quit on us on one of these ascents, but it certainly provided me with enough fear of this drive that I let the vehicle dictate what it is able to handle.
The minivan seems to do much better on this trip, but when I see the rpms climbing beyond 4000, I let some of those bastards with Hemis pass me. I enjoy later in the trip when I am able to return the favor. There is nothing quite so insulting to one's manhood as being passed by a minivan. There is some sort of psychological fear of this eventuality and as you move steadily by them in the left hand lane, they inevitably bear down on the gas pedal with absolute disregard for their own safety or any recognition of posted speed limits. I am quite convinced that you could talk your way out of a ticket if you just utilized the truth in this situation. "Yeah, officer, I realize that I was driving 93 and I see that we were in a 65 zone here, but there was a minivan that was about to pass me on the left. I've got a girlfriend here--I mean what the hell was I supposed to do?" 9 out of 10 guys would cut you some slack. There's always that one who just won't stray outside the strict guidelines of "the law," but he's the same guy who is going to cite you for speeding on your way to the hospital after your wife's water breaks. He'll probably even keep you there for an extra 45 minutes or so, just so the lesson sticks, but 90%, most guys are willing to take that chance. I don't even know if people realize that they refuse to let a minivan pass them or not, but when I am driving the Opamobile, I have no challenges making a move to the outside. The sight of that silver Caravan slip-streaming past a guy's Camry and you would think he would contract the plague if he let me pass. We guys are pretty damn funny about such things.
The drive to Sedona is pretty much a straight shot. There are only about 8 exits between our departure point and our destination. Of these, maybe two or three actually have any kind of services and there are two rest areas--one about 15 minutes north of Anthem and one about one exit from Sedona. As I was flying past the first one with the blue "REST AREA" sign still just in front of me, Lauren pulls the old "I have to go potty." out of nowhere. When we left Shari's house just minutes earlier, she didn't need to go, and I was sure of this because even in my still clearing head, I could recall asking her at least three times if she needed to pee before we left. Kim looks back at her and asks her if she can hold it for a little while (knowing full well that this means at least another 30 minutes and probably 45). Lauren shook her head and Kim sprung into action.
"Lauren, you are going to have to pee in a cup."
"Okay."
"Honey, do you think that is a good idea?"
"Do you have a better one? She needs to learn sometime."
As I move further along in life, I am always amazed at how much I don't realize. Quite honestly, I didn't realize that there was some sort of necessity to a woman learning how to pee into a cup while traveling down the highway at high rates of speed. Certainly at the age of three, there would still be ample time to figure this out for oneself, but we didn't have much choice if we wanted to preserve the sanctity of Lauren's pants and carseat.
"Don't Crash."
"I'll do my best."
The next thing I know, Kim takes a last sip of coke out of her McDonalds cup and heads back in the van. I did my best to focus on the road, the turns, the traffic and the wind pushing the van all over the place, but Kim gets Lauren out of her carseat and brings her to the back of the van and begins to coerce her into relieving herself. Without hesitation, she unloads her bladder on the unsuspecting McDonalds cup and manages a bullseye. Kim is cheering her on like she just landed a triple lutz or sowcow or something for the first time. Life is just full of so many special moments and this one to Kim was one of her proudest. As we had no Kleenex in the car, I heard something about drip drying and before I knew what had happened, Lauren was strapped back in, Kim was back up front and a cup full of urine joined us for the duration of the trip. Somehow in the grand scheme of things, this was one of the rites of womanhood and Lauren had passed with flying colors.
Kim immediately felt the need to share with her sisterhood and placed a call to Shari, Joannie and Gramma G in the car behind us. Based on what I could get out of the conversation, Shari had never peed in a cup (either in a moving vehicle or elsewhere for that matter). I couldn't tell if they were impressed, horrified, jealous or challenged to do it themselves, but Kim was absolutely beaming. The rest of the drive was relatively mundane--lots more traffic than I had hoped, a sign of things to come to be sure. We exited the highway and made the drive through Oak Creek Village and into Sedona. The temperature was a perfect 70 degrees and the sun was beaming through the red rocks. The twisting two lane road always gives Kim a heart attack. With the amount of cars on the road today, it was even more daunting. Around every turn there was another car parked on the side of the road and a steady stream of cars coming at us from the opposite direction. As we moved out of town and into the back country, we could see hundreds of people walking along the creek. We finally arrived at our trailhead, only to find six cars in front of us trying to get into the parking lot. Abby was running around the back of the van uncontrollably. She could see that we were here and she could hear the gentle rumblings of the creek down below. Being trapped in the van was about the last thing she could handle at this point. It didn't help that Shari insisted on taking her rats for a walk at that moment so that Abby could see them enjoying the fresh air while she was still trapped with the pee cup in the back of the Caravan. As one car would pull out of the packed parking lot, the park ranger would let one car in. Realizing full well at this point that we were going to probably have to keep all three of the animals on a tight leash for the duration of the day.
Gramma G and Joannie appeared out of nowhere outside Kim's window and made her jump like she saw a severed head in the shower. Gramma G was concerned that we didn't stop to go to the bathroom before we got off the highway.
"Why didn't we stop back where there was a bathroom?"
"Um. We didn't know that you needed to go.
"Well, don't you think you should have considered that?"
"Why didn't you call us on the cellphone?"
"We didn't have a signal."
"Why didn't you pull up next to us and ask us to roll down the window and mention something that way?"
She changed the subject.
"We also need to get some lunch."
"Mom, we have the dogs here. We can't really stop for lunch and I don't think it's a great idea to try to eat while driving down these roads with this much traffic."
"Well, we should have thought of that before we left."
"Mom, there's a bathroom right up there on the other side of the parking lot. Why don't you and Joannie go walk over there."
"All right, but we need to figure out lunch--we'll be starving before too long."
As Gramma G and Joannie walked over to the "bathrooms" that were nothing more than glorified outhouses, I found myself at least amused for the moment. Of course we are going to need to eat--why didn't I think of that? Oh wait a second, I am almost completely certain that I mentioned that being a problem about a dozen times over the last 24 hours, but Shari's dogs would have so much fun, so we brought them. Being hungry and miserable is somewhat better when you get to be right and others are going to suffer because of their own stubbornness. As we watched the second car in line pull in, the true hell that this day would become for somebody in our party edged ever so much closer. The imminent nature of the doom that awaited her was palpable.

Trauma in Sedona Part II--The Rats are Coming

So as I worked my way through the morning and did my best to put on my game face, I struggled mightily to do the simple tasks. I felt a lot like Hunter must feel on a regular basis--Shower, yes a shower would be good to take this film off, but maybe I should check the scores from yesterday's NCAA tournament games, just to make sure that my bracket is completely destroyed. How the hell did Davis Love III miss the cut at the TPC? He was leading after the first round--Holy Crap an 83! He's gotta feel like hell. How did Tiger do?--oh yeah, shower. The morning pretty much continued on this way through Pants, socks, shoes, keys, water--more water, etc. Finding the proper motivation and focus was proving itself to be a difficult task. After much debate, we decided that I would take the kids and Abby over to Shari's house to meet Gramma G and Joannie for breakfast, while Kim cleaned the house for the two realtors stopping by this morning. When she finished cleaning, she was going to join us for breakfast and we would depart to Sedona soon after. (this is a point of future contention in this story and I would not bring it up except that I am trying to avoid Kim blurting out some comment like "That is not what we discussed!" or "You always make everybody else look like an idiot--that isn't what happened." For the record, this and all postings are based solely on my perspective and the interpretation of facts may always be in dispute by any and all parties mentioned herein. These are the facts as I interpreted them to be in my twisted mixed-up head, and I really don't have an alternate point of reference. Suffice it to say in this instance that Kim's recollection of our conversation did not occur the same way. Now back to our feature presentation). After much confusion and deliberation, I got the kids and the dog loaded up in the Opamobile and headed to Shari's house for "breakfast."
We got to Shari's house and were immediately attacked by the rats. This is not a unique experience and anybody who has experienced hospitality Shari style would understand the pleasure one can derive from the infinite high-pitched yelping one encounters as they enter the foyer of echoes that comprises Shari's entryway. Bringing Abby over only heightens the rats' enthusiasm and with my hangover in full swing, it was the greeting I was trying to avoid. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Shari had indeed been making breakfast. There were two packs of Safeway Blueberry muffins (which were absolutely fantatsic by the way--we had been repeatedly disappointed with Safeway's baked goods over the past several years and I can't recall a recent time that Kim or I had bought anything from their bakery, but these were damn good), two bags of bagels and the distinct crackling of bacon being prepared. She had even set the dining room table and some kind of freshly brewed vanilla coffee masked the scent of the bacon grease if only for a moment.
We said our pleasantries and the kids were wound up (not quite as much as the rats, but wound up none the less). Lauren and I tried to share a blueberry muffin, but Gramma G and Joannie decided that the other 6 muffins that were destined to sit on Shari's counter for the next six weeks before Shari finally threw them away didn't look as tasty as the one that Lauren had picked out. So instead of enjoying this muffin with my daughter, I was fighting the two crazy old ladies off like they were buzzards at a fresh kill. Poor Lauren only got three bites (which was all she wanted in the first place because she is three) and I was left to forage for scraps and crumbs while the two of them justified eating our muffin because in their nutritional analysis yesterday, they found out that the 900 calories they would consume from eating a lo-fat muffin could easily be enjoyed in another way by eating so many other things that they enjoy. Whatever. All I know is that they ravaged our muffin and in their minds it was all right. Old and Crazy should be interchangable words.
By the time we finished the muffins, Shari had finished cooking the two pounds of bacon that we would obviously need to get through the morning (so much for that 900 calorie muffin theory). She then asked if anybody wanted eggs. I told her that I was going to make a Poppy Joe bagel sandwich, but would only need one egg (See The Pre Holiday Weigh-In). Hunter wanted the same thing, but wanted his egg to be runny. So I told her to break my yolk and leave his together. She interpreted this as my wanting my egg scrambled or at least mutilated beyond recognition. I decided that it would be better if I just made my own egg and put together a damn good attempt at the masterpiece that is the Poppy Joe bagel sandwich. I even burnt the bagel as a tribute to the inventor (not really as a tribute--I just can't work Shari's toaster apparently, but Poppy Joe doesn't need to know that). All in all, considering that I don't believe she has ever prepared a breakfast for another human being, she did a great job. Everybody got plenty to eat, and she even asked us three or four times how the bacon was cooked--crispy enough for you? It was like the ghost of Poppy Joe had invaded Shari's body. It was pretty special as you might imagine.
We finished breakfast and sat around for a little while, wondering where Kim was. Maybe the house was a little bit more trashed than I realized and I didn't want to interrupt her, so we just talked, digested, checked the weather report in Sedona. It was supposed to be a high of 72 today. It was also Saturday which meant that it crossed over two different weeks of Spring Break, which meant there would probably be about 30 gazillion people in Sedona today. I again brought up my concerns regarding bringing the dogs/rats with us this time. Kaylee and Savannah had never been before and there was a better than average chance that they were going to drown when they got trapped in a puddle. We also would be dealing with so many other hikers on our trail that we couldn't let them off their leashes which meant we would have to traverse the slick rocks while attached to eager and anxious animals either pulling us ahead when we weren't ready, or holding us back when we tried to move ahead. The third quandry was that as the day moved later and later, we would not be able to stop and eat with the dogs because they have never been left alone in a vehicle for more than 2 minutes and would likely empty their subsantial bowels into our upholstery in protest. I felt that this rationale would more than hold water, but Shari was dead-set on bringing the rats. "They would have so much fun." How could I possibly argue with that?
At 9:30, Kim called my cell phone wondering where we were. Shari answered the phone and told her that we were still at the house and wanted to know where she was. Kim was under the impression that I was coming back to our house after breakfast for some reason. I believe that this confusion took place for a couple of reasons. Most likely, it took place because originally Gramma G and Joannie were going to come over after breakfast and we were going to leave from here. At some point, we realized that it would make more sense to depart from Shari's house because it was a little farther north and there was no point in backtracking. As I searched my bleary memory banks, I don't recall having this conversation with Kim, but I thought this morning we were all clear and on the same page. I guess that we weren't, because Kim had run a few errands, packed the car, filled the tank with gas and was patiently waiting for our return. About 15 minutes later, she showed up at Shari's and we began loading up the car. Abby stood in front of the door with a look like Mike Singletary daring the oposing running back to try to come through the middle of the field. There was no possible way we were getting out of the house without the dog. The high pitched yelping that was permeating my skull made it clear that the rats would be coming along as well.
All three of them jumped into the minivan with us. So now, not only were we forced to endure a day with the rats, they were also going to ride on our laps all the way up to Sedona--life is a rapturous boulliabaise sometimes, treat after treat. Shari had to stop for gas for the Endeavor, so we deposited her canine imposters through the two inch opening in her window. I needed some separation from the yelping freaks. 90 minutes in the minivan was tough enough to endure with Hunter screaming that Lauren is touching him and Lauren denying any involvement whatsoever. Couple that with the majestic utterances of "Are we there yet?" (Thank you again Jordan and Jamie) every thirty seconds and you have the makings of Suburban utopia. Throw in the high-pitched skin-peeling yelps of the rat brigade and you have the recipe of Dad veering off the mountain at 75 mph. I have enough challenges staying on the road when I am trying--you don't want to encourage me.

Trauma in Sedona Part I

Today it might be a little bit difficult for me to write with anything other than straightforward facts. I need to stay on task because the emotional expenditure that I have endured this afternoon is nothing short of overwhelming. It has been one crisis after another and I am doing everything in my power to not overreact, not exaggerate, not to annihilate your senses with the details of this day, because I fear that you too would find yourself in an untenable situation, weeping silently to yourself in your barca lounger in the fetal position. I will not have that on my conscience, but I need to expunge the stress from my soul in order to free my own restless mind and senses. For those of you who are too uncomfortable continuing down this path, please divert your eyes now. For those of you who are far stronger than myself emotionally, I recommend that you tread cautiously, and be prepared to close out this posting as quickly as you may have opened it, because by the end (I don't care if you have the emotional depth and range of a half-dead mule) you will be an absolute wreck. Consider yourself forewarned.

The trouble began last night when my mother and my cousin Joannie came in for dinner at my restaurant. They are out here on a four-day girls spa weekend that they take every year since we have moved to Arizona. As their entrees were being prepared, I went over to their table to feign interest in their enjoyment of their meal (quite honestly, I have reached the point that so long as the guest doesn't punch me in the throat, I consider it a mild success--I have got to get out of this business soon, but that is another rant on another day). We began to discuss our plans for Saturday. They wanted to go up to Sedona for the day and we were determining the specifics of the plan--what time did we need to leave, who was going to drive, what we would do if they blew another tire on the way up like they did last time--things like that. They had spent the day at the spa with Shari and the three of them had already come up with a basic outline for the day. Shari wanted to bring the dogs up with us and she was pretty dead-set on this plan. We have been to Sedona many times in the past couple of years, and our general agenda when we go now is to find our favorite trail and go hiking with the kids. I am usually carrying Lauren for the majority of the walk and the times that we have brought Abby have been quite a challenging dilemma, just coordinating who was going to hold her leash and maintain our balance enough to not drop Lauren into the creek. See The Lazy Bastard Returns (Section 2) for more details about the difficulty this poses.

But Shari wants to bring the dogs--not just Abby, but all the dogs. As you probably know from the last posting and many others, Abby is a labrador retriever and loves these walks and is fully capable of getting into and out of the water with adept comfort. As long as she is off of her leash, she tags along and plays along side the rest of us for as long as we can handle it. Shari's dogs (if they can even be classified as canine) are glorified rats with a hyperinflated squeak toy trapped in their larynx. She has a 2 pound maltese named Kaylee and a sniveling excuse for a beagle named Savannah. Neither of which has any idea what to do on a hike, and I am pretty sure that swimming is not one of their primary functions. Now, as we found out earlier this month, not having swam with any regularity does not necessarily translate into not being able to swim at all, but my instinct told me that bringing the girls was not the best idea. I mentioned my concerns to mom and Joannie, but I fully realized that we would probably be dragging the rats behind us throughout the day.

The thing that really struck me as odd, however, had nothing to do with Sedona per se. Mom mentioned that they were going to meet at Shari's house at 8AM for breakfast and that we could leave from there. Their story was that Shari was going to actually make them breakfast at 8 in the morning. I think Kim summed it up best when I told her when she responded with, "Do they not see the absolute absurdity of Shari making them breakfast at that hour?" Shari lived with us for 9 1/2 glorious months. During this time, the only thing that would arouse her from her 72 hour weekend slumber was the smell of bacon grease crackling. I cannot recall one time that she made anybody breakfast during those months. The thought that she would actually intentionally be getting up to prepare breakfast for somebody else at the detriment of her weekend recovery sleep just made no sense at all. Kim had to call Shari and find out what the hell was going on, and Shari claimed complete ignorance about any kind of breakfast plan. Somehow, however, when I went to bed last night, Shari was going to be making hosting an 8AM breakfast extravaganza. Kim seemed to think it would consist of bagels (and perhaps some of those Starbucks Frappuccinos), but I still had to witness it firsthand.

My day started out innocently enough (as they all do). I awoke in the semi-conscious numbness of far too many Glenlivet on the rocks at about 7:45. My two wonderful children singing in unison "Daddy, wake up--It's a beautiful sunshiny day!" Usually I just get Lauren providing this wake up call, but today, Hunter joined in on the fun, and my bleary eyed vision could definitely make out that there were two silhouetted bodies in some reptilian fashion urging me to arise from my content slumber. Going out last night for a couple of beverages pretty much precludes me from trying to make any kind of excuse as to wanting to sleep for another 30 seconds. This is the penance of the married man--guilt supercedes all physical and/or mental damage (mild hangovers included). So I spryly made my way out of bed and did my best to maintain some semblance of enthusiasm as I embraced the beautiful sunshiny day.

It is at this point that I will pause this posting. I realize that occasionally I write a little too much on any given topic and the misdirections of my train of thought/stream of consciousness can get somewhat off track. This story could take at least 3 or 4 solid sections with all of the craziness that went on today. There should be ample foreshadowing to consume your minds at this point and a sort of Kafkaesque sense of loss awaits those who continue over the next couple of days. The good thing is that I actually have the mornings off the next few days, we will have no visitors after Gramma G departs tomorrow morning, and I will have no excuses as to why I didn't finish this soon to be epic. Please tune in tomorrow.

Yessir, that's my dog!

I realize that everybody out there who is a pet owner has a personal bias regarding his or her dog, cat, llama or parakeet. They find a way to endear themselves to us and regardless of how insane they make us with their idiosyncrasies, we tolerate them and enjoy having them around. Currently (with the exception of three or four fish--I lost count as to how many have made the flush lately) we only have one pet, our beloved Yellow Labrador Retriever, Abby.
For those of you who have met Abby, you have probably formulated your own opinions about her. She tends to be a little bit overfriendly with any house guests. She tends to eat far too much. She tends to knock over the trash can within twenty seconds of our departure. She tends to make herself comfortable with complete disregard for anybody else's welfare or the long-term survival of any furniture in our home. She tends to bolt out the front door with speed of cheetah whenever the crack between the door jamb and our left leg is larger than three inches. She tends to sleep at least as much as Grampa G with a belly full of ambien, lunesta, valium and Southern Comfort. She tends to destroy anything green in the backyard for no apparent reason. And she tends to be carry her weight in much the same manner as Chris Farley did.
But despite all of these slight character flaws, she is a beloved member of our family. She is about as much a Yellow Lab as Kim is. She refuses to fetch, and when she does, her inclination is to bring whatever it is back with absolutely no intention or returning it for another throw. I used to live with three labs (Black, Chocolate and Yellow) in Florida, and they were true to form. We lived on three acres (one for each of them I suppose) and every day, they would still insist upon breaking out and exploring the territory around them. They would fetch anything at any time, whether it be a frisbee, a piece of rope, a decoy, a tennis ball, or a stick. I could even practice chipping golf balls and one of them would gladly chase my golf balls all day and place it back at the center of my stance with the excitement of a kid on his first day at Disney World just for the opportunity to go and chase it again. Abby--not so much.
The other characteristic of Labs is their love of the water. All of our Labs in Florida had an insane love of the water. When I was in the process of building my first house in Tampa and had to allow two of my friends to babysit my dog for a month while the house was being completed, she got to stay on the banks of the Weekie Watchie River. There was a three foot drop from the embankment on the side of the river behind my friend's house and they would spend two to four hours a day bouncing a tennis ball off the edge of the wall into the river, and Godiva would run at a full sprint and leap of the ledge about 15 feet into the river to retrieve the ball. She would entertain the boats that went by and she would puke up gallons of water, pee thirty or forty times a day and have the runs for the entire month, but you couldn't make her get out of that water for anything. By the end of her stay, she was jumping off a 10 foot high deck at the neighbors house just to thrill seek. I could spray a high pressure hose in Godiva's face and she would whimper when I shut it off. In this regard, Abby at least is part lab. She loves the water, but we have not had too many great chances to expose her to real swimming. Her experience has been to jump into the tub, splash in a puddle or two that forms in our backyard, run through a wash, and occasionally when she has been truly well-behaved, we fill Lauren's baby pool out back and let her soak herself. She does enjoy emptying her waterbowl on the kitchen floor and laying in the pool she creates, but that might go back to one of those idiosyncracies that I was referring to earlier.
So last weekend, while we were forced out of our house so that another over-perfumed realtor could spend three and a half minutes rummaging through our home with some deadbeat in tow, we decided to take Abby down to Lake Pleasant for a couple of hours. I have been in Arizona for nearly five years now, but have still never been to Lake Pleasant. I went to Lake Saguaro one time on a manager outing with work a couple of years back, but other than that, we have not enjoyed the splendor that is the reservoir system of greater Phoenix. Lake Pleasant is less than ten minutes from our house, but we were unsure whether or not there were good areas for Abby to swim or walk, and in the summer, the lake is overrun with 30000 boats each weekend, so there very could have easily been no good trails at all. But since we had some time to kill, we thought, "why the hell not?"
We pulled into the park and drove around a little bit. It was a relatively quiet day, as the water temperature is still a bit frigid for our delicate Arizona bodies. There were still quite a few boaters and campers out there, but not nearly to the extent that there will be in a couple of months when there is no way to escape the scorching temperatures. We were able to find a quiet inlet with no other cars in sight and decided to get out and walk around. I was confident that Abby would test the water temperature and splash around a little bit, but I was a little bit less than assured that she would actually delve beyond the shore where she might be forced to paddle. I was also at least equally confident that my two children would wade out into the water at least up to their shorts with absolute disregard for their shoes, but that of course is a sucker bet.
Just as I suspected, Abby bee-lined it for the water. I do recall a walk in Sedona a few months back where Abby enjoyed splashing through Oak Creek for a couple of miles. Here at Lake Pleasant, she walked along the banks and went in up to her knees. I made the foolish attempt at getting her to swim out a few yards by tossing a red tennis ball into the depths, but that ball would never be heard from again. She took a few large gulps of lake water and ran back to shake her soaked body at the closest one of us she could find. I grabbed a stick and threw it out into the water and she chased after it, as she does with any stuffed animal in the house. She got close to the stick and turned around. So just on an off chance, I grabbed another piece of wood and threw it again in the shallow water and she actually went and picked it up, and returned in my general direction. This usually is followed by a tug of war, but much to my surprise, I was able to wrestle the stick from her without the usual fight.
I decided to throw the stick a little deeper, where she would be forced to leave her feet and swim a few yards. She took off immediately and pounced through the water until she got to the point that her feet were no longer firmly on the soft sand beneath her weighty frame. After a momentary hesitation and a look back to Kim for reassurance, she lifted her feet in the water and swam ten feet to the stick and retrieved it. Grunting and gasping like she had just crossed the Atlantic, she brought the stick back and soaked me as she shook her drenched fur intentionally in my general direction. I picked up the lumber and threw it out twenty yards into the water and she bounded away without a moment's thought. She swam like a champ with her meaty paws churning water behind her and her tail serving as a rudder, she looked like she knew what she was doing. Quite honestly, I believe that she knew what she was doing, and she was chasing sticks out into the clear depths of that inlet for a good 30 minutes.
Eventually another car came by and we packed up the soaking children and drowned dog and loaded up the minivan. Abby managed to puke a couple of times before she got into the van and she peed a good gallon of lake water, but I can't recall a happier moment for that dog. She was in her glory. She had, if only for a moment, managed to achieve something that none of us truly believed she was capable--acting like a real Lab.
We drove the van up the road a little farther trying to find another quiet spot and ended up on a two mile hike down into a valley where there were a couple of guys fishing off a bridge. Abby of course had to splash around there as well and Lauren became absolutely exhausted being carried all the way down and back up again. You can only imagine what kind of strain riding on Dad's back while being forced to hold on to his throat for 45 minutes can cause. Those of you who have not experienced such a thing, believe you me, it is no picnic and I don't recommend putting yourself through that kind of stress. I thank God that Lauren had the strength to hold on all that way and the energy to kick my kidneys as much as she needed to as she screamed "Giddy-up Pig" as the only way to motivate me back up that gorge. Bless her little heart.
We found our way back to the sanctuary that is our Caravan. We filled the van with the stench of wet dog and the pounds of caked-on dirt from the kid's shoes. Abby climbed up into the back seat and had herself a well-deserved rest. Well, I guess she rested until I slammed on the brakes at the light at Carefree and I-17 and she exited a dead sleep and came flying up two rows to join us in the front seat. She may have dislocated her hip for all I know, but as she limped into the house a few minutes later and found a vacant spot on the carpet in front of the TV, she sprawled out for the next 72 hours without moving a muscle, including the enormous smile of satisfaction that comes with knowing you did what they say couldn't be done. Abby is indeed a lab.