My Biggest Fear about Writing My Book Came True

Posted by Barbara Techel

It occurred as a sudden flash through my mind recently. My biggest fear about writing my book Through Frankie’s Eyes (which I’ll release early 2013) actually came true. It hit my heart with a thud. I knew I wanted to write this book. I knew I was ready. Sentences and chapter ideas had swirled through my mind for months. But I couldn’t bring myself to put my fingers upon the keyboard and start writing.

I remember being stumped and somewhat paralyzed about this two summers ago. What is holding me back? I wondered.  I talked it over with another friend who is a writer.  She suggested calling a mutual friend, Lynne, who is also a writer, but also a spiritual healer with an alternative healing practice. She thought perhaps I should go see her.

It is so interesting how small the world truly is. I met Lynne at a writing conference a few years before. Then I discovered author, Mary Shafer on the internet, who wrote Almost Perfect: Disabled Pets and the People Who Love Them.  Long story, short, Mary is originally from Wisconsin and now lives in Pennsylvania, but she went to high school with Lynne.

I made the hour and a half trip two weeks later to see Lynne at her practice. I had no idea what to expect , and I was a bit nervous.  But Lynne is a very kind and caring person, and she made me feel right at home.  She took me through a meditation which at first as we began I was not sure how that was going to help.

As I made my way to a favorite place in my mind, as Lynne guided me, I went to a place that I felt safe.  In that place,  I was told to look for my angel.  I looked and looked but could not find an angel. I thought perhaps there was something wrong with me.  But I did see someone, but was afraid to say.  After more guidance from Lynne, she said, “Do you see anyone’?”

I said, “Yes, I see God.  I don’t see a face, but I sense it is God.”

As she guided me through the meditation asking me some very personal questions, it was finally revealed with a rush of tears why I was fearful of writing my book. I was afraid Frankie would die. I felt if she did, I would not be strong enough to finish and that I couldn’t possibly go on.

As this thought came as a flash through my mind recently, I felt my heart fall to my feet. But only for a brief moment.  While I have for the most part finished the majority of the writing of my book, Frankie was my guide the whole time, lying at my feet. I know now what a gift that was to have her with me.  It was all part of the divine plan.

As I wrote my story, I felt something in me shifting and transitioning. I knew my life as it was, with the work I did with Frankie for the last five years, was changing.  While that was hard at times to accept, I was learning to find peace in another step in my evolution, reminding myself, to be open to the next leg in my journey.

Looking back, I’m glad I faced the fear and didn’t stuff it down. If I had let fear win, I don’t think my book would have been written. Though I find I am  now resisting writing the afterword, I have faith I will come to my computer soon enough. I trust I’ll spill the words onto the blank screen to complete the last piece of work that will be full circle in my journey with Frankie.

As I drove home from some errands today, the clouds in the sky were heavenly.  I thought about what my friend said to me– that heaven is all around us. To me that means our loved ones now gone are really not gone, but all around us if we choose to be open to that.  I am, and I know Frankie is all around me. As I gave that more thought I then had this very strong sense of Frankie running circles around me, almost flying, without her wheels.  She ran and ran, happy as could be, round and round as if enveloping my heart letting me know she is okay. I smiled… and I know it is was her way of reminding me that I can do this and write the afterword and that the plan as it is meant to be is unfolding just as it should.

 

All Dogs Go to Heaven, Or Did One Stay?

Posted by Barbara Techel
Thank you to my friend, Jayne for sending me this story below that was in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal.  How interesting this was in my state of Wisconsin.  Do grab a tissue before you read this.  I guarantee you will need one… I needed a whole box.  Imagine that.  GRIN.
Photo by Michael Sears

Mary and Bruce Peterson adopted Anna, whose sister, Jenny, was the Petersons’ dog until she had to be put down last year.

Anna’s sister, Jenny, had to be put down due to health problems.
This is about as close as you get to dog reincarnation.

Jenny, a 9-year-old miniature dachshund belonging to Bruce and Mary Peterson of Waukesha, died in March 2011.

Last week, the Petersons got Jenny’s sister, Anna. She had been turned over to a vet by an elderly woman who couldn’t care for her anymore.

With the original breeder of the dogs acting as a middleman, Bruce drove to the veterinary clinic and got Anna on the day she was scheduled to be euthanized.

“When the doctor entered the room with the dog, I thought I was seeing things. She looked just like Jenny. I was overloaded with a ton of emotions,” Bruce told me.

The story starts June 21, 2001, when Jenny and Anna and a few more littermates were born to a dachshund owned by breeders Pat and Carol Tesar in Edgerton. The Petersons, who then lived in Kenosha, took Jenny home in September just days before Sept. 11, and a couple from Lake Mills took Anna.

The Tesars, who have since retired from the breeding business, have stayed in touch with many people who have purchased their puppies over the years. This month, they stopped in to see the woman who originally took Anna.

She is now 82, and her husband died two years ago. He had been very attached to Anna, but the wife had difficulty connecting to the dog after her husband’s death. On more than one occasion, most recently on July 8, Anna bit the woman.

The woman told the Tesars she planned to take the dog to the Waterloo Veterinary Clinic. She had become afraid of Anna and was worried the dog would bite someone else.

Barb Smith, a vet at Waterloo, said the law required the dog to be quarantined 10 days after the bite. She held the dog at the clinic.

In the meantime, Pat Tesar contacted Barb to say he had spoken to the dog’s owner, “and if we can find Anna a good home, she’d be happier with that than putting her down.”

Pat went to his records and started contacting the people who had taken the other puppies from the same litter a decade earlier. Bruce Peterson sounded interested in possibly taking Anna. He and Mary loved Jenny and miss her but had not yet bought a new dog.

“We do not have children, so our Jenny was the next best thing. We had her for almost 10 years until she developed some back issues” that left her in severe pain and with her rear legs all but paralyzed, Bruce said. “In March of 2011 we did the humane thing and relieved her of her suffering.”

Home, sweet home

The minute he looked into the eyes of Jenny’s sister Anna, Bruce knew she was coming home with him. The clinic lent him a dog carrier for the ride home from Waterloo. Bruce called Mary on the way home to tell her they were dog owners again.

Anna immediately warmed to her new owners and their home and backyard. The biting stopped. Bruce took Jenny’s collar, which had been in a place of honor in the house along with a tin containing Jenny’s ashes, and he put it on Anna. He retrieved Jenny’s doggy bed, pillow, blanket, bowls and favorite toys from storage. They belong to Anna now.

Anna has most of Jenny’s chocolate brown and tan coloring and her mannerisms, though she does sleep later in the morning. Jenny was insistent about going outside before dawn. The neighbors noticed the new dog and got an eerie feeling that Jenny had returned.

“I said to my neighbor that you don’t get too many opportunities to get your dog back. That’s what it feels like,” Bruce said.

Jenny died too young, he said, “and for us, it’s like we get to finish what we started out doing.”

Call Jim Stingl at (414) 224-2017 or email at jstingl@journalsentinel.com

Kylie and Me. A Lesson in Acceptance.

Posted by Barbara Techel

 Kylie and her polka dot pal

Kylie, my almost seven year old English Labrador Retriever was supposed to be a therapy dog. That didn’t work out due to Frankie becoming paralyzed and due to the fact Kylie was not meant to be a therapy dog.

Someone also forgot to give the Labrador Retriever list to Kylie about what “real” Labs do. For instance:

  • Play fetch.
  • Go for walks pulling your owner down the road.
  • Hop with all gusto into the back of the car.
  • Jump in any water you may see, no matter where you are.

This is the list I think she got, or err, rather made up herself:

  • Chase that little round thing and bring it back to you?  Why?  I’m perfectly comfy sitting here at the end of the driveway gawking at all the neighbors.  Look Mom, I don’t even have to pant.
  • Why would I want to pull you down the road when I can walk at my own snail’s pace  20 ft. behind you and eat disgusting things before you turn around to see where I am?
  • Ahhhh, no way, no how, am I getting into the back of that car…. It.  Is.  SCARY!  You and papa are just going to have to muster up all your muscles and heave me in as it’s the only way I’m going in.
  • Don’t you dare spray that hose on me… aim it back towards the flowers, Mom…. I mean it, or I’m outta here!
I remember being so frustrated realizing about a year into having Kylie that she had no desire what-so-ever to do all the “normal” Lab things.  But like accepting Frankie being bound to a wheelchair for the remainder of her life, I’ve also learned to accept and love Kylie for who she is.
I remember reading that the English breed of Labs are more laid back and have more of an even temperment– but geesh, this is quite laid back if you ask me. But again, it is what I asked for if I remember correctly. And I do love her dearly.  Kylie is not all that easy to connect with as I did with Frankie, but I am trying.  Our best bonding time together is when I brush her, so I try to do that often for her. Kylie is also very independent, and I suppose she has just had to get used to that because of the more than usual care I had to do for Frankie.
Now that it is just her and no other dog, I sense she may be relishing in this one on one time a bit more.  Though I have told her, “Don’t get too used to this.  There WILL be another wiener dog someday that you are going to have to put up with.” But I also promised her to continue to accept her for who she is and that we will have plenty of moments under the big tree brushing her to her hearts content.