And then there were two: Meet Ace and Zohra

"This is the first time in my entire life that I have not had a dog." ~ Melanie

  Remi has been an only dog for seven years, since Lucy passed away in February 2012. We have talked about getting another dog off and on over the years, but I for one, enjoyed only having one dog. It made it easier to bring him along camping, or to find a pet sitter for, or to take for a ride to the store. One is easy. The down side to this is that Remi would be home alone during the days, and when we left for an overnighter, he was home alone again.

  Melanie and I have had conversations about this for years now. Until recently, Remi could handle a night at home by himself, but he seemed to have a little separation anxiety happening more recently, judging from the neighbors reports of him barking all night, not his normal "there is a cat in the yard bark" but his mournful, "I'm all alone" bark. It got us thinking about getting him dog to keep him company and debated whether or not he would like sharing his home with another dog. Needless to say, Remi passed away last month, within a few days of us returning from our most recent trip and a few days before we departed for another. While we are still mourning his loss, Melanie and I both agree that it was better that he passed while we were home and not while we were away. Two weeks later and I am still checking to see if he is laying at my feet when I awake at night.

  After Remi passed. Melanie kept reiterating the fact that it was indeed the first time in her life that she was without at least one dog. She also made it very clear that she was going to be the one that would pick out our next dog. Initially, I wanted to take some time off from having another dog to contend with, but Melanie made a very valid argument about the fact that I am traveling a lot and she would be more comfortable with a dog here to warn off would be trespassers. Melanie also made the point that the kind of dog she would want if she had her choice ( and considering that I was adamant about hair dogs vs fur dogs ~ think allergies) was a Maltipoo or a... honestly I can't remember what the other one was because a Maltipoo is my kind of dog and that's all I needed to hear. 😃
So began the search.

       Initially I thought about waiting until Melanies birthday in October to find a Maltipoo. but then I started to realize that we are headed into fall, and then winter. It would be so much easier to potty train a dog this time of year than during our rainy season. Also realizing that Melanie was headed on a road trip in a few days, I thought it would be a great bonding time for a new dog and allow her to work on potty training. Note: I did do my due diligence and checked shelters and rescues for Matlipoo's and similar breeds and was unable to find a dog within our region that would work with our family dynamics. (Skittish. Does not like children. Needs to be in a single pet home. etc.)

 




I then began to look at ads for Maltipoo's and after a few phone calls and email conversations, I discovered how many shady and dishonest people are out there. While I desperately tried to find a white, beige, or white and beige Maltipoo to add a new color pallet to our four-legged family, the unsavory people eliminated those choices for me. I kept coming back to an add in a dog publication for some black and white Maltipoo puppies. I finally shared the ad with Melanie and she was in love. I reached out to the owner and found him to be the first normal person that I had dealt with in my puppy search. He was located in San Jose and I just happened to be passing through the following day. We agreed to meet and I let Melanie know what time so she could answer my FaceTime call and pick a puppy...What a horribly bad idea that was. All that I can recall from that meeting was, "I can't decide," "If you love me, you'll get both for me," "They will keep each other company," and then driving away in a stupor with two puppies, and me being the only one of the 3 people involved in the transaction that didn't leave there completely satisfied. Now I remember why I didn't let Melanie be involved with the selection of the last puppy. 😉

  Meet Ace and Zohra. Orion picked the name Ace for the boy and Apollo picked Zohra for the girl. Yes, we are crazy for getting two puppies, and Yes, they are the cutest dogs ever, and NO, You can't have one, so quit asking!! 😂

 I think Remi would approve of these two little rascals but I also believe that he is happy to not have to share his home with them.

Welcome to the Zoo Ace and Zohra!

Remi

Why...?
How...?
What if I...?
If I only...?

So many questions, so much guilt. So unexpected...

 Remi passed away last night, August 17th, around 10:00pm. He did not come when called at bed time. Melanie and I went outside to look for him and found him lying still as if he simply fell asleep. Our hearts are broken.

  May 25th, 2009 is the day that Remi came into our lives. He was about 8 weeks old when Apollo and I "stumbled" across the little fur ball.

Melanie was gone on a girls, Memorial Day weekend trip to the Oregon coast, which doubled as a weening weekend for 1-year-old Apollo. I found an ad for a litter of puppies that were a cross between a Miki and a Japanese Chin.

Always a fan of small "hair" dogs, Apollo and I had to take a look. Apollo, grabbed Remi as soon as he met him and said, "Mine." We brought him home and waited for Melanie to return. We let Melanie name him. She chose Remi; a shortened version of Remington, although I always joked it was short for Remedial.

Remi was the ideal family dog, though it took more than six years for him to realize that he wasn't the Alpha of the family.

He never showed aggression towards another dog, animal, or person, and wanted nothing more than to be the center of attention. His only perceived rival was Orion and it took until a year ago to realize that Orion was just another member of the pack.

I referred to Remi as the boys "fur brother", and they as Remi's "skin brothers."

  Remi loved camping. If we opened the RV door for anything, while parked in our yard, Remi would jump inside and lie down in "his" chair, just to make sure we didn't forget to take him along.



He loved the beach and the water and would run in-and-out of the waves on his own accord and then splash in the water along side the boys.



  When we brought home Shredded, he became Remi's cat and not ours. He welcomed every dog into our home and always had impeccable doggie manners.

Remi climbed in bed with Apollo every night at bed time, and then waited until Melanie and I went to bed. He would then sleep at my feet all night, leaping from the bed and racing out the dog door at the slightest hint of something being amiss.








He chased off raccoons, possum, fox, mice, snakes, cats, and skunks...that is until he finally got sprayed twice this summer. In his mind he felt betrayed; he only wanted to play with the like colored funny looking dog.










At 10 1/2 years old, he still had a lot of puppy in him. Remi was energetic and playful, even on the day that he passed.
Melanie and I have been playing back the days and weeks leading up to his passing. Its the natural thing to do I guess, struggling with guilt. Did we overlook something? Was he sick and we missed the signs? If we looked for him sooner, could we have saved him?
Remi had a great life with us, but it was far shorter than we would have liked.  Our home feels empty and our hearts are heavy.

  Remi was our pet, our companion, our protector, and our friend.

Run free little buddy. We love you. We miss you and always will. You took a huge chunk of our hearts with you when you left.

Remington - March 25, 2009 ~August 17, 2019

Orion turns 8

Has it really been eight years? Two thoughts on this; It seems much longer than eight years, but then again, eight years seems to have passed by in the blink of an eye.





 Orion is our enthusiastic kid. His excitement and anticipation for all things fun, is only matched by his heartfelt disappointment when things do not go according to his plan. This kid has my heart. He is adventurous, energetic, bright, thrives off of interacting with others, and wants to be in the middle of everything.




 Seven brought on the loss of no less than 4 teeth; mostly his front teeth. Orion managed to swallow one tooth while eating an apple but the tooth fairy still left him ten bucks.
 


With weekly swim team practice, Orion swims like a fish. His confidence in the water has grown tenfold this year. He will tell you that he hates swim team but the skills he is gaining are invaluable and truth be told, his mom and I love to watch him swim.







 Orion has been doing flips into the pool since he was three-years-old. Now that he has access to a diving board, he does front flips like a champ!

  Every year with Orion is my new favorite age. I am looking forward to 8 and eagerly anticipate every moment we spend together.


Never change. Always be yourself and proud of who you are. Be confident, be bold. be strong.

I love you with my entire heart.

Happy Eighth Birthday Orion!

Apollo turns 11

He may not have received his Hogwarts letter, but he is plenty magical when it comes animals. His patience and understanding of them, draws animals to him. He is endlessly entertained by creatures and never tires of them or their antics. He is Newt Skamander, Radagast the Brown, or Saint Francis; take your pick. His favorite part of any trip to anywhere in the world, will undoubtedly be some interaction with an animal. The world can use more wizards like him.
  Apollo turns eleven today and as I reflect on his life this far, I feel an immense amount of satisfaction and pride. As his father, I see his potential. I know what he is capable of becoming. I also know his weaknesses and what his struggles are. As with any parent, I want the best for this son of mine and want him to be successful and happy when he becomes a man.

  At 11, Apollo stands about 5' tall. He lingers in the 90th percentile for height for his age. He loves tennis, cycling, and enjoys swimming. He is an avid reader and always has a book in his hands. Currently, he is reading the Harry Potter series.
 Apollo has a quick wit, great sense of humor, and an over developed sense of sarcasm. One of my greatest pleasures in life is when Apollo decides to wake his mom up in the morning before she wants to be up. With a very exaggerated tone of bliss and contempt in his made up, high pitched voice, he will pet her head and her arm while saying things like, "Oooooh! What happened? Did the morning come too soon? Are you sleepy? Time to get uuuup!" And when Melanie protests, it just adds fuel to the fire, "Ooooooooh! Did you get angry? Get up mama! Time to get up?"

  I can honestly say that Apollo is a happy kid. I see it on his face when I pick him up from school. I see it in his eyes, and hear it in his voice. And then there is that smile. Not the cheesy smile that he uses whenever we try to take a picture of him, but the genuine smile that can light up the most dismal room. 
 Eleven is gateway age. The journey through puberty, testosterone, and attitude is at our doorstep and I am nervous about navigating the next phase of his life. But for now, I am content with this gregarious animal loving boy of mine.



Happiest of Birthdays Apollo!!!

~I love you~

51

If I'm being honest, he's been there my entire life; hiding in the shadows...in the corners...in my dreams. In my youth, he had no form beyond the darkness  and the random sounds in the night. I learned to ignore him in my post-pubescent, testosterone driven, invincibility years, but I know he was still there lurking in the shadows. While I ignored him, I feared him most in those years, feeding him all the energy that he needed to start to take shape. I was in my early 20's when I first saw him clearly. He saw fit to show me that I was indeed mortal, reaching his long tendril like hands around my chest and squeezing the very air from my lungs, watching the terror in my eyes as the world faded to black.
 At some point I made my peace with him and began to fear him less as the years passed. Still, he was there. Always watching, always following close behind. I often saw him out of the corner of my eye, following me out of the plane in my skydiving years. I think he loved skydiving as much as I did. I always imagined him smiling as the ground rushed up to meet us.
Now, I see him when I look over my shoulder checking for cars in the road, when i'm on my bike. He's on a bike of his own, black robes billowing in the wind behind him, peddling hard to keep up. I admittedly will peddle harder at times to make sure he doesn't get any closer. He's always there with the first glance but gone when I look again, yet I know he is still there; following, waiting, biding his time.
  Macabre as it may sound to speak of death in such a manner, I don't see his presence as a dark omen. Just a simple reminder of my mortality and how short and precious and delicate this life is. I've made it more than half a century on this earth and I hope to find several more decades before my time is up. While I may not fear death himself, I am not ready to submit to his final voyage either. I want to continue to walk my young boys into adulthood, watch their successes, help them get up after their failures, watch them become men and start families of their own. I want to explore more of this world and see as much of her beauty as I can and hopefully do it with Melanie by my side, while I still have the strength within my bones to do so.
  My mantra in my youth was once, "You only live once!" In my older years, it has changed to, "You only die once, but you live every day."
 I am grateful for another year. Too many friends have not been so lucky to make it this far. Every year, a couple more friends take that final journey. Some never saw it coming, others knew and fought the good fight to the end, and then there are those who succumbed to a period of immense sorrow and loneliness and chose to end their suffering on their own. For some, their time ended in throws of doing what they loved...I count them as the fortunate ones. For all of them, I grieve and because of them I choose to live everyday. While time and money may limit my ability to travel and explore the world on a daily basis, I still look for and find something every day that reminds me how beautiful this life is.  God willing, I will never feel the touch of the grim reapers cold grip upon my heart or ravaging tendrils eating my body from the inside, or stealing my memories and my dignity over time. I hope to see him following behind for many years. When alas, plagued by old age, my body says, "enough is enough." I will then greet my old friend Mr Reaper and let him take me to a tropical paradise where I will patiently await the ones left behind to live their own long and fulfilling lives.

  

Jack-Jack

 "Oh no, oh no, oh no!" How can just two small words carry so much weight. The image of Apollo holding his lifeless pet bird in his hand, the look of sorrow, disbelief, and utter shock on his face, while he muttered those two words, will be for ever ingrained on my heart.
"I'm sorry Apollo, she's gone and I cant bring her back," is all that I could manage to say as I embraced him.

Jack-Jack came to us a couple years ago as an owner surrender, like most of our birds. I am not sure why people think that since we have a bunch of birds already, that we want more, when the novelty has worn off for them. Needless to say, against my wishes, we took "Jack" (misidentified as a male), into our home and renamed her Jack-Jack since it sounded a bit more feminine.
  Apollo went straight to work and made Jack-Jack part of the flock. She became very sweet and responsive to both boys, but pretty quickly she bonded with Apollo, even though we had a male cockatiel named Sonya (another gender mis-identification). Sonya never identified as a bird and never met another cockatiel until Jack-Jack and so he was not interested in Jack-Jack in the slightest.

 The two birds tolerated each-other but both pined for Apollo's attention. A third cockatiel came into the mix not much later. Lovey was her name but we called her Jill-Jill to complement Jack-Jack. Apollo and his birds are inseparable. He enjoys their company immensely and takes them out in the mornings before school, and then as soon as he gets home from school, and they spend much of the day riding around on his shoulders or sharing a meal with him.
  Sonya passed of age related bird issues, Jill-Jill is crippled, but Jack-Jack seemed to be young and healthy. A few months ago, Apollo noticed that Jack-Jack was ill. We didn't think that bird would last through the day as bad as she was. Melanie began treatment immediately and nursed that bird back to health. Its been a roller-coaster with her since; she improves markedly, then declines, Melanie starts treatments again, and Jack-Jack perks back up. We thought we would lose her on a couple occasions but she seemed to be back to full health for the last few weeks with Apollo watching her for any signs of illness. Unfortunately, tragedy never offers a warning and Jack-Jack ate her last breakfast with the boys this morning.
  As a parent, you try to help your child navigate through their emotions. You teach them to face them and deal with them. Anger, frustration, insecurity, envy...all present their own set of challenges but grief is the big one, the hardest of the group. Grief is the one emotion that cuts you deeply as a parent as you watch your child experience it. I would do anything to take on my child's pain so he never has to feel that way. The sorrow, the guilt...the loss. It's all I can do to maintain my composure as I watch him sit down for a meal, look to the cage expecting to see his bird or hear her call to join him, and then watching the sorrow fill his eyes, as his appetite leaves him.
  Jack-Jack was happiest when she was on Apollo. She would snuggle up to his cheek or in the crook of his neck. Sit with him while he read. Eat off his plate at meal time. Fly to his shoulder if he tried to walk away. More than anyone I know, Apollo is fascinated by birds. He knows their moods, their body language, and loves their personalities. Everyday, they give him something to laugh about or ponder. He has their stretching pattern memorized. We call it birdy-yoga and he stretches along with them, or would initiate it and laugh when the followed his lead. It is a marvel to see him with his birds and any wild life for that mater. He has so much patience and compassion for animals.

  Dealing with loss is part of owning pets. It is inevitable. This is not our first rodeo, and we deal with some sort of loss every year. Some are just harder to accept than others. Especially when they go suddenly or when they are young. We have mitigated them all rather well but this one has hit Apollo pretty hard. We comfort him in the knowledge that Jack-Jack had the best life she could have ever hoped for, that he made that life for her, that she loved him and could tell that he loved her. The tears are not wasted on her loss. She was his friend and she will be greatly missed.

Fly free Jack-Jack

Orion turns Seven

He knows every way to manipulate me. He knows how to pull on my heartstrings more than anyone else in the house. He is a fierce negotiator. He is easy going, social, happy, kind, and loves to laugh. He gives the best hugs. He genuinely misses me when I am gone for the day and greets me by yelling "DADA!" while running to me and throwing his arms around me when I walk through the door.

Orion is the baby of the family; our last born.  He is literally the icing on our family cake and we could not have asked for a better soul to finish off our quartet of boys. 

At seven, Orion is entering the 2nd grade. He will become an uncle in a couple months. He loves riding bikes, swimming, soccer, collecting rocks, loves surprises and gifts. He speaks Spanish beautifully and does well in math. He is creative and artistic and likes to draw and color. Orion is a bundle of energy and enjoys being tickled, wrestling, and relishes being chased around the house. 

Orion is the easiest to bribe out of our four boys. By this I mean, you can negotiate with him and if he perceives the deal to be favorable, he will approach a complete stranger and ask him/her for something in anticipation of earning his prize.
With all the boys, from a very young age, we have encouraged them to go ask for a napkin in a restaurant or ask for a refile of water or some other simple task designed as an exercise in social norms. Orion outperformed all his brothers in this area. He has no qualms about standing in line at a store and purchasing a book, toy, candy, or ice cream all on his own. He can be slightly on the shy side but will easily engage others or readily respond to others when approached.  He understands the value in social reciprocity. 

                                                             Orion enjoys hearing stories about and looking at pictures of his early years. He laughs at his antics, often mistakes pictures of Apollo as a toddler for himself, and watches old video clips of himself with great interest. He is curious about where he was and what he was doing and who he was with. 

"How old am I in this picture dada?" he asked one day. 

"You were two and a half," He considers my answer and studies the picture intently. "Do you remember this?" I inquire.

"Nope," he begins, searching his memory, "I feel like I was born at three, because I don't remember anything until I was almost four."

Orion does not hold grudges. He easily forgives and loves freely. He is excepting and inclusive. He has charm and charisma. He has a heart of gold. I consider myself lucky to be his father.

 To an amazing son; you bring endless amounts of joy and fun to my life. You keep me young. You keep my honest. You teach me patience and show my how to love unconditionally. I am thankful beyond measure to call you my son.  Happy seventh birthday!! ~  I Love you!