Dividends

The end of the countdown has begun. I'm 2-1/2 weeks away from my next epidural.

These are usually my worst weeks. I am beginning to feel the worsening, which is disappointing.

However, comparatively speaking thus far, I am still much improved from this time last year, and even since this time last round.

Yesterday as I sat in a lounge chair sky-watching, clouds moving along their shape-shifting journey, I wondered, Where are the dead people? Something I wonder about from time-to-time. Is there life beyond this one?

I don't have a definitive answer. No one does. We all have beliefs and hopes about what lies beyond. Some have near-death experiences or experiences with those already deceased. But there are still no hard facts; at least that have convinced me.

Yesterday I turned 57 years old. It was a good birthday.

I spent most of my birthday with one of my pet-client dogs who stays in our home regularly. He went blind in the past few months. The blindness isn't due to age, but rather, a disease for which there is no cure. So he and I have been learning together.

Earlier this week, as he sat beside me in the passenger seat strapped in with his doggie-seatbelt and I in the driver's seat strapped in with my human-seatbelt and singing out loud along with a song that has inspired me the past few years as I've learned to accept but not-be-defeated-by my own disability, I sang for my dog-friend too. I included his name along with mine in whatever-song-it-was. I then told him with a smile and a tear, "We're disabled comrades....abled-differently comrades...That's us!"

We then proceeded to Pilot Mountain for a short hike. Beneath his feet, he got to feel the trail, and even some roots, and walk on flat rocks.

It was a beautiful, breezy day. He took in as many scents as possible. At one overlook, he stood with his face to the sun and a gentle mountain breeze. He seemed in total bliss.

I certainly was.

More good memories for the bank....