The Lost Brother

While at dinner with my family in San Antonio last week Jon said grace and in his prayer he thanked God that 'Our lost brother has come home'.  

Today I leave Memphis to return to New England to tell this story.  As you know I've tried in the past and either the timing or platform or partners didn't pan out.  Events that have transpired in recent months have convinced me the time is now.  

Admittedly the problem has primarily been me or more specifically the standards I set for it.  Just as with the two walks I wanted to do something no one else has before and relegating the story to the Christian book market or a PBS special was unacceptable.  Even a film festival documentary didn't seem sufficient.  

The epidemic of cancer in our companions demands and deserves the widest audience possible and I've always pushed and pushed to that end.  But one lesson I've learned repeatedly is you cannot depend on anyone else to realize your vision and like life on the road it's you and you alone.  

I now know how to tell this story and the manner in which to tell it so once again I set off into uncharted waters. 

Brother, I am lost no longer.  

YBD 2.27.17

Midnight with Murphy

I should've been fasting these past 10 days out in the hinterlands of Tennessee.  All alone in my trusty tent starving myself of sustenance in order to achieve some greater clarity, understanding and context that occasionally is lost to me.  Heck I was packed up and ready to head out and then something stopped me.  Can't say what for sure - but the cascade of events set in motion since have been nothing short of metamorphic.   

Recently, I met a man who showed me another way and for the past two weeks I've been doing some serious transcendental shit; acupuncture, chanting, Reiki and sensory deprivation (not like Altered States - I'm already a beast of a man but more internal, intrinsic).    If I didn't know better I'd think I'd been smoking some serious Humboldt county style Boo-Ya.  Yes, yes I got a PhD in weed on the west coast.  

Sure, I've acknowledged the possibility and potential of and even dabbled in these Eastern type practices but never personally, truly, and profoundly have I explored them.  And now I'm down in it.  

So where is it going to take me?  What's the endpoint of it all?  To this, I am as yet uncertain.  But here's what I have learned thus far on this new path.

The Fallacy of 'What Should Happen Should Happen'

I was never any good at Logic - not the concept or application of it - but in the scholastic sense and  as a subset of philosophy.  So in attempting to make sense of the sequence of events that led me here to this time and place - I made up this fallacy which is basically the basis of flawed logic. 

People often ask me why did you walk those thousands of miles.  Oh sure, I've got a pocket full of reasons.  The fun, flippant one - everything is bigger in Texas and when we lose a dog to cancer down there we don't walk around a park, we walk cross country.  Then I've got the media sound bite version - sharing Malcolm and Murphy's story from town to town to raise awareness of the epidemic of canine cancer. I've got many more but you get the point.  

Perhaps they are all truths or variations of the same one but for me it's because I believed walking from Austin to Boston would help heal my loss of Malcolm, to soothe my savage heart. And then within weeks of the final mile, Murphy was diagnosed and, well, most of you know the rest of that story.   

And so I walked another 1,700 miles doubling down on the belief that THAT would heal me.   

You see the fallacy in this logic?  That because I believed it should, it should've.  But it didn't.  

Luke 4:23

You know, it's commonly thought that the origin of my name is 'light giving' and the best known example of it is the apostle Paul's traveling companion and doctor.  This proverb - I had to look that up since, um, well I usually skipped Bible study in search of less pious pursuits shall we say - in Latin reads cura te ipsum  - 'Physician heal thyself' something that's been a bit of an impossibility for me it seems.  

I suppose my post-facto rationalization has always been - I never spare myself any emotion for Malcolm and Murphy no matter how painful.  I can endure it.  Just like so many nights on the road and asea, I can weather this storm.  But I have suffered so.  

Self-imposed or not.  

Disconnection

Back to this newfound friend of mine, whom I barely even know. He showed me that pain can be a way to separate yourself from others.  To disconnect from them.  Furthermore, he said that people like me unknowingly use tragedy to spare themselves from the need and necessity of love and letting others in.  

I'm not sure if I believe all of his bullshit yet - but hey, I'm listening.    You see, it's one thing to turn tragedy into action - oh, I've done that and then some.  It's quite another thing to allow that experience to truly transform you.  And it's here I find myself at this intersection.   

Life Off Road

Not to put too fine a point on it but I've become a bit of an expert on backpacking the byways, highways, back roads and farm roads of this incredible land of ours.  But take me off and away from it and I tend to fall apart.  Perhaps it's because I'm always in pursuit of an idea, a belief, a cause - our cause - that remains elusive to me.  Or maybe it's as simple as finding sedentary existence unsettling and like Carthamus I'm damned to a life of wandering and wondering.   

And while I have been pretty good at chronicling and sharing my journeys on the road with you, I've been decidedly deficit in talking about it off, especially post west coast.  From now on, that will change.  I won't let fear, doubt, uncertainty, darkness or utter despair disconnect me from you again.  

In part because some of you have said to me you find the latter much more inspiring and relatable if not essential than the former.  And in part because my new friend tells me to.  

That and I need a simpler formula for existence.  I live.  I learn.  I write.  Something like that... just less cheesy and Julia Roberts sounding.  

Postscripts

Two blogs in draft right now (1) On Turning 36 - My travels and adventurin' have taken their toll on Yer Big Dog so I lick my wounds and tell tales about it; (2) The Theory of Cancer - lately my thinking has gotten so abstract and theoretical about the evolution of cancer. Where is it going and how can that affect our thinking about the future of therapeutics? On societal and civil re-engineering?  Reflections on my conversations with thought leaders and a whole host of other ideas - this will definitely be a multi-part project. 

There are more... lots more but I'm attempting to do a better job of prioritizing my crazy.

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YBD's Notes 1: The name of this blog has a special meaning to me.  Back when I was a businessman in Texas I would often take Malcolm up to my office in the evenings and that inspired a series of writings I entitled Midnight with Malcolm.  Dunno what the change denotes quite yet...

YBD's Notes 2: I stuff hyperlinks in my blogs if'n anyone wants to learn more about things that fascinate me but be forewarned - logic will make yer eyes water.  

YBD's Notes 3: Upon further reflection 'What Should Happen Should Happen' SHOULD be a fallacy. Oh boy.

YBD's Notes 4: Coincidentally, whilst recently consolidating all of my scant worldly possessions from around the country, I found this photo of me taken at the blessing of my childhood home.  I've seen too much of this world in this life to believe in coincidences.  Thanks to my sister-in-law Linda for preserving it.  Nice bowl cut, Mom

YBD's Notes 5:  I should choose a name for my new friend - he's not imaginary.  I Promise.  At least in my mind.  In this room.  That's white.  And padded.  

YBD's Notes 6: Perhaps it's still too early for me to write - no, I'm always doing that - to publish about these transcendental, metaphysical experiences and experiments.  But hey, at least I'm rounding again.  

damn dog

That'll be carved into my tombstone. 

I always found it to be a cosmic irony that I was the guy picked for this job if that's even the right word for describing my life's mission.  But trust me this was not the path that I chose for myself.  

Today is the anniversary of when I lost Malcolm - he was a gift from an ex from some distant land some distant time ago.  I didn't know a damn thing about dogs back then other than I didn't want one.  I worked 12 hours a day times 7. I was the chairman of this, the director of that... the creator and entrepreneur and my life didn't lend itself to distractions.

And that's what a dog was to me. A distraction.  

You see Malcolm & me was no easy thing.  He balked when I wanted him to obey and for six long months he and I were at war.  I didn't know back then but I believe now he was fighting for my soul. 

And isn't that the lesson?  No spirit should be secondary.  Not to anyone or because of anything.  

It's been a decade since lung mets sent him into congestive heart failure and Malcolm died in my arms.  It was an inglorious death to a giant and only those who understand, understand.  

damn dog. i miss you. damnit. 

YBD's Notes: What better way to celebrate Malcolm's life than by damning him. I'm quite certain he would've done the same about me.  He was a beautiful boy.  

Love Actually

I often joke that after Malcolm died I sold my truck and put my stuff into storage but it wasn't just a soundbyte.  Nothing I do or say ever is.

But after almost a decade, tucked away on the I-35 corridor in a 10x10 closet, it was time for a reckoning. That's an interesting word.  Reckoning.

Its origin can be found in old English which gave rise to such concepts of calculation and conclusion.

2014 is the 10 year anniversary since Malcolm was first diagnosed.  How many miles, how many years have I walked since then?  How many people have we touched and inspired?  How many lifelong friendships have we forged?

It's incalculable.  Just like love.

Another true joke is that in short order, in 2004 my dog got cancer, my girlfriend left me and she took the truck.  The pathetic irony is well, I'm from Texas.  But that year I was all alone I watched a movie Love Actually.

You see, I'm the last person to watch romantic comedies or really anything to do with Hugh Grant but it spoke to me about the messiness of life and love and how little I knew about it all.  But I've watched it every year since and today is no different.

Happy XMAS.  Love actually.

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YBD's Notes 1:  There was a reckoning tho - I cleaned out my storage locker most of which ended up in a landfill, the rest I've given away to friends and family.  I am unencumbered.  Except by love. 

The Cross

I just realized after talking to one of my girlfriends that it's father's day.  

I've had my nose to the grindstone so to speak that I almost forgot.  This week is also the anniversary of the final mile in Boston, Indiana's birthday, and 3 years since the death of my son, Murphy.  

Crossing over the Columbia into Oregon yesterday was more than just a milestone. What Stover, the well intentioned and seemingly genuinely interested reporter left out of his article was this:

This walk is all about the crossing and not just borders.  

It's the cross I wear around my neck between the ashes of Malcolm and Murphy that doesn't represent a religious symbol but a commitment.  

The symbolic representation of a cross can be found in every culture as a partnership and a promise. And, at times, a lean-to when you need it. 

It's bridging the gap in understanding that cancer is a cross species epidemic. It affects all of us. Cancer. Touches. Everyone. isn't just a tagline or some cutesy saying I came up with.

I was stopped recently and asked, 'What type of cancer are you walking for?'.  Isn't it interesting that question?  That this disease so subdivides us?  

Dog cancer.  Pet cancer.  Canine cancer.  Human cancer.  Melanoma, lymphoma, breast cancer, liver cancer, prostate cancer....

The most important takeaway point from Stover's interview was this - the microscope does NOT discriminate.  

I didn't really know what this second walk was really about until now.  I had an inkling and an instinct.  But now I know.  And on this father's day, I give thanks to my father for imparting to me a thirst for knowledge and understanding.  And my mother who helped me cross that with faith and belief.  

No matter how many bridges I cross I miss my sons.  Malcolm and Murphy.  

THE RIPPLE: Chapter 1: Man Plans. God Laughs. Dogs Poop

In the first week of launching the Austin to Boston walk in 2008, the whole weight of universal forces bore down on us like the wrath; a swift and unforgiving maelstrom that tested our mettle absolutely.  

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First there was the crippling weight of my pack because I didn't want to be caught on the road without some essential tool, doo-dad, device or sundry to assuage the uncertain world I had just thrown myself into.  

Though I made a pact with God to get me and my boys to Boston safely didn't mean I didn't have a backup plan. Or two.  

Hudson and Murphy's safety was of paramount concern to me and I packed for it. Shit, I carried enough medical supplies to run triage in a war zone.  I had a secondary leash that could counter as a tourniquet, micro flasks of iodine and isopropyl alcohol, and gauze pads of all sizes and shapes.   

A NOAA radio, batteries of all flavors, my clunky Dell laptop, and a seven iron to ground against lightening strikes and guard us from gophers, golfers, or god knows what.  

I barely made it five miles the first two days and even though I was in supreme physical condition, the weight of my pack almost became walk ending.  My lower back was already badly damaged from a work injury and later a car wreck and the sheer act of lifting my overloaded 5500 cc Osprey tweaked it even further. 

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And then the skies unleashed their fury.

Scientists say that of all of the senses, smell has the longest memory.  For example, you'll never forget the acrid, stinging stench of a skunk.  That's true, but I'll never forget two sounds.  

One of which is the shrilling of my NOAA radio warning followed by the voice of the Atari Man, the nom de plume I assigned to that analog version of a linesman casting weather forecasts like a Pong match.  

Tornado warning. Wind speeds up to 50 mph.  Freezing hail.  Flash flooding.   Seek shelter.  

And indeed, Atari Man called it right.  Lightening storms and unrelenting rain opened up all around us and it got so bad that we abandoned our $20 Walmart tent off the northbound side of 973 for the underbelly of a nearby bridge.  

Clearly, this wasn't the way I planned it.  

And that was just for starters.  

Fire ants, crazy sponsors, a lost bag, forgotten antibiotics, bad burritos, and a mad cow man followed in that first week. 

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YBD's Notes 1:  I have a good friend going through a tough patch and in her words, she's in 'Protection Mode'.  

There are some things in life for which there is no shelter and if it wasn't for the proverbial kitchen sink being thrown at us the first week of our walk, we would have never made it.  

I remember with perfect clarity in the tent with my boys what made the difference.  

YBD's Notes 2: Early on, I had to understand which weight to shoulder and which to shrug.  That wisdom carries forth to our second walk.  

YBD's Notes 3:  Very few things are worse than being in a bad bad storm when your dogs gotta poop.

Beginning Again

So much has happened since the start of our first walk and its finish...

Murphy being diagnosed with nasal adenocarcinoma within weeks of our final mile and dying a damn hard death less than a year afterwards broke my heart beyond repair.  

And then I tried my best to live a normal life but I have a mission that beckons me back on the road.    

Come this May 11th, I'm walking again and if you've been reading this blog, you know the route: Canada to Mexico via the West Coast Seaboard.  

And as we begin making final preparations and training for it, I've realized that this is the way to portray the first walk.  

I'll begin again.  

Midnight With Malcolm

I'm not MOT but I may as well be an honorary member.  

It's been eight years since I lost Malcolm and not a second not an hour not a day nor a year has past since I lost my first son that I have forgotten.  

The Yahrzeit candle burns for 24 hours and I lite it now to burn til the morrow when he was given rest.

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You were the rock that became the ripple.  

You are the circle not round that I followed and found two ends ever bound.  

My candle is an eternal flame, lit by you and I'll carry it for as long and as far as I can.  

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The Problem is Goats

Yes, I got all of the messages and emails about the book, thank you for those that have been reading it. 

The reason I haven't been publishing the weekly vignettes the past two Tuesdays is my laptop went kaput and I've been trying to resuscitate it ever since.  

Well I've just learned that it may be brain dead and, perhaps, it's time to pull the plug.  But that means some of the first book, The Rock, will be lost. 

But maybe that's a good thing. 

Maybe I needed a fresh perspective. 

Dyslexics of the World Untie

I get confused with numbers and dates sometimes.  Today is day of the final mile NOT the 16th.  But if you make it all upside down it looks the same.  

Been a tough week for those of you who know the entirety of this story but it's also been a good one, too.  It's also Indiana's birthday and I think I've come up with a recipe for lobster ice cream for the fuzzybutts.  

It being father's day week and a few other anniversaries, people have been asking me what's the greatest thing I've accomplished along the way.  It's simple.  Family. 

Sons of Men

Three years ago to this day I walked the final mile into Boston in honor of the memory of the son I lost to cancer.  

It's curious to me why there isn't a day devoted to sons... and daughters since without either, one cannot be a father.  And more importantly, it is they who define us as fathers.

My life was forever changed in 1997 when Malcolm came into mine and there hasn't been a single day since he isn't in my thoughts.  And Murphy, too.  They have cut a watercourse so deep in my heart that bathes me with their beauty and buoys my soul when dark and sad.  

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I was blessed with a good and decent and devoted father.  From him I developed a love of learning, a fidelity to truth and understanding, and an ability to reason my way through things.  And it was because of him, in a big big way, that we made it to Boston safely.  

Even though I trained for the walk, I wasn't a seasoned backpacker, but I figured that if I kept my wits about me, assessed and anticipated risks accurately, and used caution as my guide, I'd make it okay. There are countless examples and I probably won't recount every in 'The Rock', but an early one stands out in my mind.  

Just north of Buffalo, TX, there are a span of three consecutive bridges in the mudflats that are impossible to go around due to the fact that the terrain is basically a swamp full of cottonmouths and other dangers.  But what made this stretch of bridges particularly treacherous was that it was a byway between two interstates and all of the supersized semis, you know the ones that say 'overload', used it and on this day, there was a steady stream of them.  

My initial reaction was 'too risky' but this was when we had little ground support and there were only two options, press ahead or turn around.  I'd like to think that I'm not a backwards moving man but I would if it would cost the lives of me and my boys.  

So I stood there on the side of the road assessing.  For 30 minutes, maybe longer.  And I realized I had one advantage and that was line of sight.  Since it was the mudflats I could see a mile ahead and so I started timing traffic because I knew if we got caught on anyone of the three bridges when two big trucks were crossing at the same time, we didn't stand a chance.  

I timed the first then crossed.  Then waited, timed, then crossed the second.  Then the third.  And even though there were a few times I had to huddle Hudson and Murphy against the guardrail, we survived.  And not because of my balls but my brains and I owe that to my father.  

My father also taught me perhaps the most valuable of all life lessons early on.  There is no greater pain than losing a child... 

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Gloria Filiorum Patres... The Glory of sons is their father.

We are sons of men.  

Happy Father's Day. 

THE ROCK: Chapter 8

THE BOTTOMLAND

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‘I left this place

And head asea

Into the swells

Ne’er alee.

No land I seek

No shore no more.

For me the end of revelry.’

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It would be much later on when I learned that immediately following the death of a loved one, a sense of relief is very common.  That comes from not only the end of suffering but the release from the incredible mental and spiritual strain from making constant medical decisions on behalf of those who cannot speak for themselves, whether a child, debilitated relative, or a companion animal.

Your sense of confidence is under continuous and often daily assault from measuring treatment against quality of life and your own self doubt.  And to complicate matters, decisions are routinely made with a paucity of data and a preponderance of speculation so basically your best guess is no worse than that of the opinion of the most trained specialist. 

That weight can at times be unbearable so after the passing of a loved one an unshouldering occurs.  But the feeling is fleeting and often followed by emptiness.  A week after Malcolm was cremated I held a small, private wake then quietly sank down into the dark side of sadness. The tailspin was swift and absolute.  

You have to understand up and until then I had never lost anyone close to me.  Both my parents and all of my siblings were alive and I’d never experienced a traumatic loss.    

Hell, before Malcolm I never knew such a thing possible with an animal and that a human could have parental instincts and emotions with non-humans.  And now it was gone.  He was gone.  That sun which had shone new light into my life had set and with it, my will to live. 

Abraham Maslow constructed a theory of motivation in the mid-twentieth century called ‘Maslow’s Hierarchy ofNeeds’.  Often portrayed in triangular form the highest level is self actualization – the penultimate goal of humans he argued.  The bottom represents the most basic human functions like breathing and eating without which none of the higher levels can be attained. 

And I was barely even there.  I was on the ocean floor where you would find strange and grotesque looking creatures like blob fish, fang tooths, ghost sharks, and vampire squid.  In the absolute absence of sunlight and air, their existence consists entirely of the basest of survival and when Malcolm died I drowned myself to live amongst them.

I never knew humans could suffer so deeply and for so long and for most of 2006, I remained at the deepest depths of despair desperately holding onto Maslow’s bottom rung. I slept for days then couldn’t sleep at all. It was a living hell, the haunting nightmare we all have of being a coma patient but conscious and awake.

For months after he was euthanized, I kept replaying Malcolm’s final moments, exhaling his last breath, and his limp lifeless body falling into my arms. My mind became caught in an endless video loop that played every night and I couldn’t make it stop.  

I didn’t know it at the time I was going through what I now know as post-traumatic stress disorder. I was incapable of recalling the memory of Malcolm’s death without experiencing the extreme emotional trauma that came with it. 

Even now years later, it's still painful for me to reflect upon because I blamed myself for it.  The way I was raised, depression is a symptom of a weak mind and lack of will and character but I honestly couldn’t will myself to move on. 

Isolated, wrought with grief, and devoid of all hope, I don’t know why I didn’t die that year. I felt like a big part of me had and I drank enough to do the job.  But the absence of a will to live is not the same thing as a desire to die.  I had made three promises to Malcolm before he was given rest and that kept me holding on to that bottom rung. 

And slowly over the ensuing six months since Malcolm’s passing, I pulled myself up.  One motherfucking rung at a time. 

But I did get a little help.  And by little, I mean an 8 week old Pyrenees named Hudson. 

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YBD’s Notes 1:  Next week is the eve of our launch of Chef Big Dog so instead of starting Chapter 9, I’ll compile all chapters to date in a single blog for all of you kind and discerning readers.  The following week, I should be in full stride and ready to publish the next chapter:  Hudson & Murphy, the Fabulous Fuzzybutts

YBD’s Notes 2:  The title of this vignette was loosely based on a duet between Lyle Lovett and, unsurprisingly the beautiful Emmy Lou Harris, a constant source of inspiration through most of my life.  Here’s the link to a youtube performance of it with Lyle’s large band and even larger hair.   If you do have the courage to walk through the bottomland, like they say in the song, there’s only one way to do it: without no shoes. 

YBD’s Notes 3:  One of the most invaluable things I’ve learned from the thousands of people we’ve met and the stories they have shared is that everyone grieves differently.  That being said, I chose to suffer alone and I strongly discourage anyone from doing the same.  There are support groups at many of the veterinarian hospitals throughout the country and there are online communities as well.  And I am available to anyone at all hours of the day to anyone who needs an understanding ear. 

THE ROCK: Chapter 7 Continued

Til the Last Ember

September 2009

We were on the Rails-to-Trails from Pittsburgh to DC on the second stretch known as the C & O canal.  The Canine Cancer Caucus event was upcoming and Hudson and Murphy and I had some blazing to do.  Earlier in the day, a storm descended down on us, it was light and non-electrical, and I decided to press ahead though much to the consternation of the fuzzybutts.  

The rain abated and we made it to the next campsite on the towpath.  There is so much truth in the old saying that fire warms the traveler's soul but it did much more for us that night.  Temperatures had dropped precipitously  throughout the day and by the time we made camp, the three of us were shivering wet.  

With the sun still unset and the boys snuggled up inside the tent, I gathered what dry wood and kindling I could.  Over a thousand miles into the walk I was an old salt at starting fires in all sorts of conditions and it didn't take long before the flames flickered and my body warmed.  

But with the rainstorm, it was slim pickings and I couldn't find enough dry tree branches and twigs for the fire to reach the maximum combustion point, the point at which all wood burns.  So the warmth was brief and it seemed to die out as quickly as it started.  But I was so cold that I couldn't leave its side.  

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January 2006

The week after Malcolm was given rest was an unexpected surprise. I felt very little sadness and loss inside me and  I remember saying to myself, "Luke, you're doing so good, man."   I was preoccupied with planning his wake with some of the friends and neighbors that helped out in the last months of his life.  And I spared no expense in forethought and detail as it was to be a grand celebration. 

But unlike a traditional Irish wake, there was no keening at all.  Just joy and laughter and story after story of a great soul.  The 'Jumping Armadillo' was one of them.  As the hypertrophic osteopathy worsened, it was harder and harder for Malcolm to move about but I would take him out in the evenings to sit in the grass and savor the outdoors that he had all of his life.  

One evening, he and I heard some rustling in my father's juniper bushes.  He couldn't get up and investigate so I did.  As I pulled apart the blue-berried shrub a freaking armadillo leaped up at me, like four feet high, almost kissing my nose and I squealed like a school girl.  That in turn, got Malcolm up and on his three legs and over to me.  To defend me or eat the armadillo I'll never know.

As the wake wound down, we laughed and drank and toasted until dawn and then a darkness descended upon me, swiftly and mercilessly.  

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You see, I had loved Malcolm as a father loves his son and when he was gone, the great fire I felt for him, for life, was extinguished.  

I didn't... I didn't know that people could suffer so deeply and for so long.  

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YBD's Notes 1:  Next week begins Chapter 8:  The Bottomland.  

YBD's Notes 2: Thank you to all of our friends that were so kind and generous with their love and support in this chapter of our story.  

Bluebonnet Spring

The fabulous fuzzybutts and I are in the Nutmeg State now prepping for our taste testing Saturday and this morning we took our constitutional through the neighborhood we're staying at down to Clinton Town Beach.  

The purple or tulip, as they refer to them up here, magnolias are all abloom as are the weeping cherry trees, dogwoods, lilacs, flowering crabapples, and flora I have yet to discover. I have to stop and catch my breath from the beauty of it all at times and I often wonder if the people up here truly get the gift from god they've been given.  

When you walk south to north, as we did on our cross country trek, you're chasing spring and everything opens up all around you for weeks and weeks.  It's magical really and one of our most memorable experiences was walking on the old Boston Post road or route 1 along the coastline of New England.  And though I love fall just as equally to follow it, you'd have to walk from north to south.  

Sometimes I wish I could take a projector to my brain and broadcast it for you.  I try to write that way but words often fail to capture the glory and grace of life.  

But I couldn't help this morning, amidst all this splendor, missing the bluebonnet fields of my native state.  They stretch for miles and miles and it's as if time stops in Texas when they bloom.  Whenever I'm longing for my family and the place I grew up, I listen to Gulf Coast Highway, a duet between Emmy Lou Harris and Willie Nelson.   It's a simple song about love and life and one that I sang to Malcolm the day he was given rest.  

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YBD's Notes:  I'd love to share the song with you but the insidious industrial music studio oligopoly in this country doesn't believe in beauty without a steep price and youtube removed it from my second memorial to Malcolm.  The more tragic aspect of it was it was removed after we walked through the Nashville area and spent an afternoon with Emmy Lou at her dog rescue, Bonaparte's Retreat.  She does great work there and her rescue is named after her roadie dog she lost to cancer.  Please don't contact her in protest - she had nothing to do with it.  Studios screw everyone, even artists.  My apologies for including this in today's blog but I must.

THE ROCK: Chapter 7

Painted Pink

Once Malcolm's cancer had spread to his lungs and been given a death sentence, I packed up my belongings in Boston and moved back to Texas to be with family.  

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I remember driving the boys back home.  It was on the BQE, crossing the East River, that I considered it for the first time.  Malcolm was coughing incessantly and I was inconsolable.  A flick of the wrist, the steering wheel turns, and it would all be over.  

I had never considered suicide as an option for life's travails before, it seemed so counter productive, but I couldn't imagine a life without Malcolm either.  

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But I could no more give up on him as he never did me.  

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I came up with a saying to get us through the hard days when Malcolm could barely make it out the door for our daily constitutional. "We don't give up.  We don't give in.  Until the end, my friend."  

Every day I uttered those words to Malcolm, in part for him, in part for me.  

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When you bear witness to a loved one dying before your eyes, it crystallizes your constitution.  Malcolm went down hard and I went down hard with him.  

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January 11, 2006

It wasn't the bone cancer that took him down.  Not directly anyway.  It was hypertrophic osteopathy.  Malcolm was in congestive heart failure because his lung tumor had grown so large that it forced fluid in his hind legs rendering them useless.   

I had made the conscious decision the day before to take Malcolm off his pain meds to better assess his condition.  In poker, it's called forcing a hand. 

When Malcolm could barely even walk, my hand was forced, the decision predetermined.  No one should have to make the call to kill our kids.  Even in an act of kindness.  It's not the correct order of things.  

But on this day, I took Malcolm to Dr. Gosney's clinic and held him as he died in my arms.  

After his lifeless body slumped, I couldn't help but wonder why the substance in the syringe that took his life was colored pink.  And who was the person that chose that color?  

THE ROCK: Chapter 6 Finale

PAS DE DEUX

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Pas de deux – noun.  Fr.  An intricate relationship between two things.  A dance.

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It didn't take long for Malcolm and I to figure out how to make it down the slippery, wooden winding steps of our new home in Somerville and learn how to navigate the virgin seas together.   

Years earlier when I had an office at the Tech Center in San Antonio at nights and weekends I'd bring him and Murphy up to my second story suite.  There was a red-railed concrete balcony all of 10 square feet or so off the west side our office overlooking Fredericksburg road that became his realm.  

Malcolm would sit outside upright for hours, with a quiet and content stoicism that fascinated me.  Had his soul been incarnate, he would have been a philosopher king.  Some people say we anthropomorphize our dogs too much.  I say not enough.  

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Malcolm's spirit was unconquerable and indomitable.  With crystal clarity I recall a crisp Autumn New England morning.  I was sitting on our porch drinking coffee and reading the Wall Street Journal.  Murphy was tethered to a baluster but Malcolm wasn't.  Where the hell would a three legged dog go I thought to myself.  

I had just nestled myself into the rocking chair and hadn't even gotten to section B before Malcolm jumped up, cleared the stairs, crossed the street to a neighbor's Sycamore, and treed a squirrel.  Coffee spewed all over me and the journal strewn all over the porch, down and outright amazed, half-crazed and scared, I couldn't stop laughing.  I couldn't help myself.  

It was the first time I laughed in a complete and innocent way since April 2004 and it would be the last that year.  Despite amputation and chemo, cancer ultimately spread to Malcolm's lungs.  One morning, he just couldn't get up.  An emergency trip to Angell-Memorial revealed that he had a grapefruit sized mass in his lungs.  

Bone cancer is just an awfully damn aggressive form and by the time dogs become symptomatic, it's most likely already spread, the lungs the most likely place.

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The thing I had the hardest time with, I mean other than the fact that we'd just been given a big stop clock, four to six weeks they said, was that Malcolm stopped eating.  And he was a passionate eater, too. 

I added dog gravy on his kibble, cheese sprinkles, and all of the other tricks and incentives I read about but they just didn't work.  So I put my apron on, got in the kitchen and started making food for Malcolm.  At first it was ground beef and brown rice but I quickly expanded his menu to include chicken and steak.  Hell, he ate better than I did.  

And he snarfed it all up.  And that gave me pleasure.  I found that the kitchen became my only sanctuary, where I was free of stress, anxiety, and sadness.  I was feeding my boy and filling him full with my love.  But it wasn't long before I became his chef biatch.  He'd look at me with those eyes that said, 'Go make me a sammich'.  

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And I would.  You see, love is a dance where one leads and the other follows.  It's an intricate mystery that defies logic and understanding. And yet it is.  

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YBD's Notes 1:  I'm forever indebted to the folks at NEVOG, Angell-Memorial, and Dr. John Berg and Shelly Rodman at Tuft's Vet School who gave me counsel, consolation, and hope during a very hard time.  

YBD's Notes 2:  I've been working on a big project and this Sunday, I'll post about it here.  

THE ROCK: Chapter 6 Continued

It was the summer of 2004 when I really learned how to love and hate.

After Malcolm's leg was dissected and Anna left us, I had to find a new place to live.  I didn't have any friends or family in Boston at the time as we were only there less than six months when I got the diagnosis.   It's not easy to find a place to live in the Boston area with two big dogs.  

I was all alone.

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Ultimately, I met a kind fellow, Ron, who had a spare room in Somerville Ma, in a beautiful and historic area but it was on the second floor, atop a spiral winding staircase.  I was in a bit of pinch and we moved in but on our first day there, Malcolm, three legged now, down and outright refused to walk down the stairs.  They were too steep and too winding.  

I remember our first day there I couldn't get him to walk down the stairs to go outside.  He wouldn't budge.  

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I cried for the first time.  I failed him.  I failed myself.  Things didn't work out in Boston like I planned and Malcolm was suffering as a result.  

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My tears lasted only for a moment and then I figured out a solution.  Malcolm was afraid of falling so I put myself in front of him, kneeling down before him.  Chest against chest, we made it down the staircase.  We did that every day for the year we lived in Somerville.  

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Too often we think of love and hate as finite points but in reality, they're just degrees of beauty.  

THE ROCK: YBD Unplugged

1. Ed didn't like the last installment of Chapter Six.  I didn't unpack it enough I suppose and I guess I wasn't entirely satisfied with it either but birds fly, fish swim, dogs walk, and writers write.  

I don't think I like anything I do.  It's never good enough but she's right in that I left out a few critical aspects of Malcolm's limb amputation.  First of all, nothing prepared me for the surgery.  I thought leg must go not leg plus shoulder.  

It was a total ablation of one-fourth of Malcolm.  The extent of his surgical lesion went almost from stem to stern.  

2. Recently, I was sent a quote from CS Lewis that I've paraphrased and seems particularly relevant.  "I hope no one who reads this book has been quite as miserable; but if you have been - if you've been up all night and cried till you have no more tears left in you - you will know that there comes in the end a sort of quietness. You feel as if nothing is ever going to happen again.”

3. Telling this story was part of the deal I made with God to get Hudson and Murphy cross country safely.  You don't bargain with God but I don't bargain with the safety of my boys either.  I'm trying to do a good job of telling it and I'll continue to try to do so every week.  For those who are reading, thank you.  

THE ROCK: Chapter 5 Continued

It was slight, almost imperceptible Malcolm's limp at first.  I kept asking my girlfriend, Anna, if she saw it, too, as we walked along the Charles, and she said she didn't and that I was being neurotic and too maternalistic.   Which in hindsight probably wasn't too far off the mark.  If I could've bubble wrapped him without a PETA intervention, I may just have.  

Still I took Malcolm to a vet in Watertown, MA, and walked him all over the clinic like a show horse and they didn't see anything either.  Sad as it were he was like a shimmy in a steering wheel that you can't reproduce when taken to the auto mechanic.   

I knew it was there.   But at the time I was thinking it was perhaps a recurrence of his OCD which he was diagnosed with back in Texas that the bitter cold New England winter had exacerbated.  Or Malcolm had Lyme Disease which is exceedingly common up here that can lead to a degenerative neuro-muscular melt down.  

I vacillated for a couple of weeks half convincing myself nothing was wrong yet half knowing something was.  

Three things happened next.

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My dog got cancer.  My girlfriend left me.  And she took the truck.  

In some cruel cosmic irony, this Texas boy, who within six months of moving up to Boston, became a country song.  

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I remember when Anna and I first moved up to Boston in 2003, we were looking for a place to take Malcolm and Murphy for a hike and surveying a map we saw the Emerald Necklace, a sprawling almost contiguous swath of parks designed by the great Frederick Olmsted.  

We got lost looking for Back Bay Fens and saw a beat cop at a convenient store.  I pulled into the parking lot and asked him for directions, which in a thick, sweetly grating Boston accent he gave us smilingly.  

"Thanks but, say", I asked him, "I'm not from around here but I can't help but notice that there aren't any street signs in this city.  Why is that?"  

Without a second's hesitation he replied, "If you don't know, you shouldn't be here."  

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Maybe he was right.  I shouldn't have been there.  I should never have left my native state of Texas.  But just like playing a country song in reverse doesn't get your dog, your girl, or your truck back, one cannot undo the order of things.  

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I finally insisted that the vet in Watertown take X-Rays on Malcolm to be sure and when he delivered the diagnosis, I remember saying, "Wait, what?", as though my comprehension needed to catch up to the reality.  

I didn't even know dogs got cancer. 

Sure enough the vet showed me the star burst pattern on Malcolm's radiograph, an image permanently etched in my memory.  Through my tears I asked a question that, although I didn't know it at the time, would design and determine my fate for the rest of my days.  

"But, why?"  

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YBD's Notes 1:  I'm an honorary New Englander now and as I write this, in the wee hours of the morning, the great foghorns on the Narraganset Bay bellow nearby and rock me with pleasure.  

YBD's Notes 2: I didn't realize until writing this vignette that Back Bay Fens was where the final mile of our walk began.  Ironically, it wasn't our first choice.  The Esplanade was.  Funny how things work out.   

YBD's Notes 3:  I find people who use tragic circumstances to further a personal agenda distasteful and even though I am a transplant, I just want to let the people of Boston know that I stand proud with you.  And to that beat cop, "Maybe so.  But I am here."  

THE ROCK: Chapter 5

GIANT ANTS DANCING AROUND WITH TOP HATS

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I love comedy.  Not the easy, one-liner, spoon fed sitcomy crap but the bold, unapologetic, nook and cranny kind.  The kind that creeps up on you in unshakable fashion with unspeakable precision and for me, that's Louis CK.   But it took me years to find him.

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The year that I was selected as one of San Antonio's 'Rising Stars' was the year that I decided to betray my Texan roots and move on.

While in college, I had built a consulting practice that focused on commercializing technology and within just a few short years, I was at the top of my game but it wasn't good enough.  Texas had a great and growing nucleus of high-tech and bio-tech startups but I wanted to be a part of cutting edge research and that meant going to either the West or East Coast.

I choose the latter and loaded up Malcolm and Murphy and Anna, my girlfriend at the time, and we moved to Watertown, MA, into a rental a block off the Charles River.

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I don't think the terms solace or contentment apply to men like me but we can come close enough and walking along the Charles with Malcolm and Murphy on our daily constitutional got me as close as I'd ever been.

The beauty is indescribable.  There's a bend in the river where time seems to stop, where the light catches its surface refracting a spectrum of colors and a stillness to it.  We'd walk it up and down, back and forth in awe of the Charles.

I still remember that place with absolute clarity not only for its stunningness but as a simple, singular answer to the question I had at the time as to why I moved there.  Yes.

Certain as I was of my life choices and damn well determined to do great things and then, on one of our daily walks, everything changed.  My whole life reduced down to a dog walk along the Charles.

When Malcolm limped.  

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