Every year we went to the farm.  When I was little, time seemed to pass so slowly there.  And as kids, we had mastered the art of living in the present…which as I look back as an adult, made time pass a little differently if not more slowly, now that we live in a world of constant expectations and comparisons to the past…  But, I digress… the farm:  I remember we were surrounded by nothing except woods filled with ancient oak and hickory trees, moss covered rocks jutting out of the hillside, (reminding us that we were in fact, in mountains, of sorts), and an horizon that stretched out past the flower dotted prairie fields, past the woods, to infinity.  The old, white farm house sat on top a range of hills in the Missouri Ozarks.  I felt on top of the world when we looked out on those fiery sunsets from the safety of the trampoline, just the two of us.  Those were some of the best summers of my life, when we left behind our everyday lives and the family made the trip to that old rustic farm in the country, and you and me had 200 acres of playground to ourselves. 

Sometimes, I thought you hated it there, so far away from urbanization – you would even pack up your Nintendo and play it in that old worn down farm house.  And, even though all I wanted to do was be outside, I would sit with you in that sunken living room with the wood paneling and watch you play video games.   But, eventually, even you couldn’t escape the adventures that waited outside the front doorstep. 

We spent most of those long hot summer days just outside the front door where Dad and Grandpa Cliff had built a huge wooden swing set that was more structurally fit than the house.  It was complete with a slide, at least two-stories of look-out platforms and even a zip-line.  An ancient oak tree sat next to the play-set and seemed to watch over us when we played.    

On one particular day, Mom and Dad had decided to cover the entire jungle gym with sheets….I remember, we were transformed into a land of thieves, knights, and maids and for that afternoon, Chris and Molly no longer existed, we were Robin Hood and Maid Marian, and Chris ran the show.  Dad was immediately drawn into the action and from there, deemed King John.  Grandpa Cliff sat in a lawn chair with a beer under the shade of the tree and watched us play, as usual, heckling Dad from the sidelines and subbing as Friar Tuck or Little John when necessary.  Mom sat in a lawn chair by Grandpa and occasionally jumped into the scene when Maid Marian needed saving from King John or Robin Hood became too “physical” with the wooden sword crafted by Robin Hood’s friend and ally, Friar Tuck (or Grandpa Cliff). 

Since leaving Illinois my mind has often wandered back to that time, that place…and I can’t help but think how often if at all yours made the journey back to that time in our lives…

It was hot and the air was thick and sweet.  Cicadas buzzed and birds chirped, filling the air with the familiar chorus of summer.  I giggled uncontrollably as I blasted down the slide shrouded in old sheets, you yelled with glee after me while passionately swinging a wooden sword “Run maid Marian, I’ll take care of things up here!” and I ran wildly around the swing-set, knowing my big brother was there to protect me from any impeding foe.   I hoped that day would never end.    The sun was setting; mom declared it was time to come in…the swing set was  abandoned, the wooden sword tossed aside and we walked together, brother and sister back to the house as day gave way to night.

I’ve had a lot of great Thanksgivings in my life…and a few not so great. With the holiday coming up very soon, I was chatting with my friend about the perfect Thanksgiving, who would you invite? Fictional characters, movie stars, dead family members? The sky’s the limit…After putting some thought into this idea of the perfect Thanksgiving table, I think I would repeat a Thanksgiving of my childhood. One that seems so long ago, it feels like a dream…

I wasn’t even in school yet and my family had recently acquired a small 200 acre farm in southern Missouri. My parents decided to have both sides of the family over to our quaint little farm for Thanksgiving.

This being my fantasy Thanksgiving, what was so great about it? Well, as I’ve grown older, my huge family (I have 19 first cousins and 6 aunts and uncles on my mom’s side alone) has grown apart and, as it is with time, relatives, grandmothers, grandpas, have died. Also, there is something wonderful about childhood that you only have once, something wild and free. That Thanksgiving I had more fun playing with my cousins and running through the woods and old barn than I had eating.

In reality, I will never have that Thanksgiving back. But I think I need to appreciate the family I have now, the one that has evolved and branched off from that huge trunk that my grandparents started so long ago. The same family that was in it’s golden age that Thanksgiving at our little farm in Missouri. It’s humbling really when you think about it. How, in a matter of less than twenty years, a family that started in the same place, can change so much.

I have never told this story to anyone.  I’m wiriting it in hopes that others will understand the strong bonds that form between dogs and humans.  From the time early hominids ate meat, dogs have been by their sides as companions.  Dogs are the only creatures (other than humans) that will experience mental abnormalcy without routine interactions with humans.  Admittendly, my life would not be the same without the influence of all the different animals I’ve known in my lifetime, I owe my life, the shaping of my personailty as I know it, to dogs.  This story is just one example of why that is.   

I was 14 when my parents bought me Daisy from a reputable breeder in St. Louis. She was a fawn Great Dane, with a little white patch on her chest. When I was 16, my family and I moved to Reno, NV. I was torn from my high school and all my friends and the familiar place I knew as home. When I moved to Nevada, I was home schooled, I had no friends. Not only was Daisy my best friend, she was my only friend. I was a lonely 16 year -old, but I would have been lonelier still, if it weren’t for Daisy. I can’t imagine what my life would have been like those first few years in Nevada without her. When I started working part-time, I had become so introverted I wished and even imagined Daisy was at work with me, walking by my side like she did at home.

I still lose sleep over how she died. I still blame myself for it. Daisy died of mesenteric torsion. She had a gastric torsion a few months before and her stomach was tacked up, but she bloated again.  Even the vet said he had never seen anything like it. The morning she died, it was July 5^th, 2005, she was whining to go outside. I figured because she had to go potty. It was around 5 am. I told her to go back to sleep…I wasn’t going to let her out at 5 in the morning, I was 19 years-old and practically comatose at that time in the a.m. I feel like, if I had listened to her then, instead of telling her to go back to bed, I would have saved her life.   She didn’t have to go potty, she was telling me that her mesentery was twisting. I think about that moment constantly.  In fact, almost 3 and a half years later, I still hear the phone ring in my memory, hear the vet’s voice on the other end telling me there’s nothing he can do for Daisy. I see myself shoving the phone in my mom’s face and running to my room where Daisy’s bed was, where she was sleeping then whimpering, just hours before. I clutch her favorite toy and sob, and still feels warm to me. I run through that memory over and over and over…like a broken record.  In fact, that same toy sits on my desk in my living room below her picture.

Why do we do this to ourselves?  Blame ourselves for years later… I’d like to think a part of me died when Daisy died, or at least a big part of me changed. I felt like I had played god by getting her from a breeder. I’m not a religious person in the Christian sense, but I knew Daisy had changed my life and I wanted it to be for the better. I love animals more than anything in the world and every day I find they affect our lives more dramatically than most humans. Daisy made me think differently about dog breeding and now I get all my dogs from rescues. I still feel guilty for Daisy’s death and that if I had gotten her to the emergency vet a couple hours earlier she might be sitting with me right now as I type this, but at the same time if she had survived, how many more surgeries would she have to live through in order for her to live just a few more years, all to make me happy? And I might have gotten another dog from a breeder, another dog bred with the genetic disposition to torsions. Daisy taught me that dogs should not be bred for looks, but for health, for welfare, in order to live a happy life with humans, not to make humans’ lives happy. Daisy taught me, like all animals I’ve ever known, to look for the meaning behind the relationship and time that we had together. Animals have taught me more than any human.

Daisy is a huge part of my life.  And I think in some aspects she has impacted me more so than any human.  Perhaps people that don’t see dogs or other companion animals the same way I do, have, unfortunately, never seen how an animal can touch your life.

I complain a lot.  I complain about my job, my boss, my co-workers, about the amount of money (or lack there of) I have in my bank account, about how stressed out I am all the time, about my grades, my car, about stupid, stupid men and dating in general, and basically how crappy my life is.  But the truth is, I’m one lucky woman. 

I’m in my early 20′s and I live alone with my dog, in a one bedroom apartment, in a nice neighborhood with a private balcony.  I have a good job that pays well while I’m in school and it’s in the research field, something I want to do for the rest of my life.  I just got back from Mexico and didn’t contract a G.I. bug!  I have a beautiful horse, an animal that some people never have the oppurtunity to be near their entire lives.  I am able to travel regularly (maybe not as regularly as I’d like too…).  I have a wonderful family and friends. 

So, I may be tight with money sometimes and be late on a few payments here and there or have to go without food in my fridge for a week or two (believe me it’s happened).  Or even have to put up with arrogant co-workers, or a micro-manager in an office (ugh!), but at least I’m not living in a crowded house with a bunch of irresponsible stoners by night and taking people’s lunch orders at McDonald’s by day, right? 

I always told myself that I loved Illinois, the corn fields, the smell of livestock every morning before I went to school.  I never wanted to leave.  My grandpa was born, died and even burried in the same town in Southern Illinois.  In fact, my entire family, from cousins my age, to aunts and uncles a couple generations older than me,  is comfortable remaining stagnant, in one place: where they were born and where they will eventually die.

I found myself in this same rut a few years back.  I was comfortable, I knew everybody and everything from the owner of the local pharmacy and grocery store to the quickest route from my house to the movie theater (I even knew the owner of the movie theater and was able to screen new movies for free from time to time).  I had no desire to see new things, to travel, and moving was definitely the farthest concern from my mind.

But alas, recession blind sided the country in 2001 and my father was laid off from his job of 20 years.  I was in high-school, and I tried every excuse I could to stay in Illinois, including bording school, but in 2002, after living over a year without an income, the only job available in my dad’s profession was in Reno, Nevada. 

Suffice to say, after we sold the house that everyone from my grandpa to my dad helped build, I moved with my mom and dad to the vast, unknown West.  I left my sister, my brother-in-law, and two nieces in Illinois along with the rest of my family.   I didn’t know what to expect.  I left crying, looking back on my familiar home the entire way. 

The drive to our new home reminded me of something out of Steinbeck, and I still feel to this day, that we’re lucky we didn’t have to burry anyone on the way. 

It was a four day excursion and along with the majority of our most treasured belongings that we didn’t trust the moving company with, we were hauling six ducks, a rabbit, and a great dane across the country.

When we finally arrived in Nevada, we were greeted by a giant mud-slide that derailed our caravan, breifly.  But what was even more upsetting was that our house was still being lived in by the previous owners.  So, with our six ducks, one rabbit, and great dane, we lived in a hotel for a week, while I suffered from continual nose-bleeds from the dry climate I thought would never go away.

I hated Nevada, it looked like death compared to the lush green of Illinois.  It was dry and brown and there were no trees to provide any reliefe from the sun’s unending abuse.  What was worse, I didn’t have a friend in the world to share my greif with. 

What happened?  As a 17 year-old girl, My 3-year-old great dane, Daisy, literally became my best friend.  I talked to her like she was a real human being, we went on walks together, I would’ve taken her to school and work with me if I could have.  Without Daisy, the year of my life in Nevada would have been even more hellish than I couldv’e imagined.

Although Daisy died freakishly, the vets said they’ve never seen a mesenteric torsion in a Dane (gastric torsions are very common in Great Danes, in fact, Daisy survived this breed-specific malady) the reality is, the move to Nevada forced me out of a shell that Illinois kept me locked in for the better part of my life.

After a year of living in melancholy, my heart aching for the vast, green farmland of my home-state, I lost over thirty pounds.  I started working and actually gained the motivation to learn how to drive.  I’ve traveled the country and gone to Europe.  And of course, I’ve met some wonderful people I know will stay in my life forever.  

I can’t say I owe this change to Nevada.  But evolutionarily, life is not meant to stay stagnant.  Look at the Galapagoes, a string of islands, untouched by human development.  Finches and tortoises have migrated from island to island, and by doing so have changed, adapted to live longer lives.

I look back at my family still stuck in the same rut, living and dying in the same place they were born, living with eyes closed.  I wonder, I hope, that I have started a migration that will better their lives.       

 My family has made the decision to move; not just somewhere else in Illinois or even St. Louis, but all the way across the country.  I will be ripped out of the most comfortable spot I have ever been in my entire life and thrown into an alien environment, with no friends or relatives, besides by parents, to console me.  All of my older siblings will be left here, in their comfortable niche of Southern Illinois.

My mother and father are going to drag me out west to a town in northern Nevada called Sparks where a job awaits my father.  My father is a toxicologist and has directed tox. studies for Monsanto for twenty long years, until the company merged with another pharmaceutical company called Pharmacia.  This is when Monsanto was forced to let my dad go; thus far, he has had no job offers from any pharmaceutical companies in the St. Louis area.  

 I have lived in Southern Illinois for my entire life, and I don’t know anything else (perhaps the cause of my reluctance to leave).  I was born in Belleville, Illinois and I lived in a town a little south of Belleville called Millstadt for eight years.  When my older brother, Chris, was about to enter high school, we moved to Columbia, fearing that Belleville West Township High School would have a bad influence on my brother. 

To this day, I sit in my beloved house in Columbia, looking out the open windows and seeing the never-ending farm fields and meadows.  I listen to the mocking bird atop my chimney and watch the barn swallows swoop in and out of the cracks in my deck, making a nest they have made every year since my family built this house.  I breathe in the thick, humid air that is tinted with the sweet fragrance of honey suckle, and I realize I’m not ready to leave.

I walk into the house and memories flood my mind.  All of the tough times and good times are sparked in my memory just by looking in the kitchen.  This is the room where my duck, Cheerio, died; where I learned my sister was pregnant; where I learned my mom had cancer; where I learned my mom was in remission.  This is the room where my brother-in-law, sister, niece, brother, mother, father, and I ate supper, sometimes in silence and dismay, and sometimes in laughter and great conversation. 

As I work on homework assignments on the computer in the study, I’m reminded of my school.  Governor French Academy is where I’ve been taught some of the most valuable lessons of my life.  This is the school where so many teachers have impacted my way of thinking as well as my entire life.  I am convinced that teachers at this school are like no other teachers in the world.  No where else has any teacher gone out of their way to help me learn. 

This school is where I have made the most fulfilling, worthwhile friendships.  As I sit and listen to guitar playing at lunch, giggling at break with my friends, or even smirking at lame jokes certain teachers dispense everyday, I realize this is what I’ll miss the most.  I’ll miss the insane comments of the headmaster, going out to lunch with my closest friends, and having an informal sing-along with twenty other kids, all off-key, while one kid plays the guitar.  This is when I realize that this school is one of kind.        

 After school, I sit in my room relaxing.  I remember playing dress up with my cousin and pretending with my niece; the sleepovers I have had with my friends, and some of the most enlightening conversations ever.  This is when I realize, change happens.  It doesn’t matter where or how you live, sooner or later everything changes.  That change is what life is all about.  Whether or not this change will be for the better or for the worse is for you alone to decide.

       I feel now that my time in Southern Illinois is a mark that will be left here for eternity, the trees and flowers I have helped plant in my yard will all serve as contributions I’ve made.  Perhaps I have done all I have to do here, and it is time for me to move on.  Maybe there is something waiting for me in Nevada, something that needs me more than Illinois.       

 I will be moving to Sparks, Nevada this summer.  I will be picking up my life here and starting anew in the West.  Whether or not this is a bad thing, is up to me to decide.  The worst situation can be turned into the best time of your life if you just look at it from the right perspective.  

I can’t remember exactly how old I was, or my reaction when I was told of my mother’s ailment; in fact, the memory of the entire time when my mom was sick is all pretty hazy.  However, the few things that I do remember are as clear as day.  I suppose I was about 8 or 9 years old, my family and I had just moved and we were ready to enjoy our first summer at our newly built house. 

My mom was a very healthy person, she had quit smoking 3 years before and had lost over 60 pounds; her diagnosis was completely unexpected and took the family by surprise.  I remember the first surgery.  Mom had a lump in her breast, a small benign tumor that needed to be removed; this is when the doctors found a malignant growth hiding behind the benign tumor.

I was sick with a cold when my mom was taken into surgery.  So, without any other options at such short notice, I went to the hospital with my mom and dad.  I sat there with my father, fully equipped with coloring and activity books and my old Nintendo game boy, in the waiting room while my mom was being operated on.  I never thought that anything would ever go wrong with my mother’s surgery, all I knew was that I didn’t have to go to school and I got to have lunch at the hospital cafeteria.  I was thrilled.      

It wasn’t long before word of my mother’s diagnosis got out.  This is when flowers, balloons and other plants began arriving at our new house.  I thought all of these beautiful plants and balloons to be a perfect addition to our home.  Soon the gifts of plants began to overflow into my room; I thought the flowers made my room look like a jungle and I loved them.  To this day my mother, reminded of her chemotherapy, will get queasy looking at flowers, while I’m reminded of the wonderful smell and decoration that they added to our home.

I was not old enough to be left home by myself (and my parents weren’t about to leave me in my older brother’s hands — they did this once and returned finding two kids with their arms around each other’s necks and the house turned upside down) when my mother was diagnosed.  So, every first and third week of the month I accompanied my parents to St. Anthony’s Medical Center for my mother’s treatment.  I remember that I wasn’t thrilled at first when my parents forced me to sit in a waiting room and do my homework while watching other depressed cancer patients drag in and out for their treatments — until I noticed a large fish tank filled with beautiful exotic fish and various sea anemones.  Instantly I forgot my boredom (as well as my homework) and focused on the fish.  I was hypnotized by the swirling colors and graceful movement of the animals.  Every chemo treatment I looked forward to watching these creatures, and I never seemed to notice my mother’s discomfort.

Eventually, I noticed that in the treatment room, where my mom was hooked to an I. V. delivering the toxic medicine into her veins, there were small dishes of candy placed all around the room. Obviously these were for the cancer patients, but the nurses and other employees never objected to me helping myself.  The nurses saw me as a poor little girl whose mother had cancer — all I saw were fish, nice old ladies, and candy. 

I never saw much of my mom during her bout with cancer.  Most of the time she was huddled like a scared turtle in its shell, under her blankets locked away in her bedroom.  So, she did not do much cooking.  This meant I got to eat whatever I wanted.  T.V. dinners became my main diet.  I missed my mom cooking for me, but the fact that the T.V. dinner came with a chocolate brownie and icing made up for my mom and dad forcing me to eat my vegetables.       

     Through the eyes of a child the most depressing and stressful situations can be seen as an opportunity to find joy.  Events similar to my mother’s bout with breast cancer are only scary and depressing because we are taught, with age, to see it as such.  With an optimistic outlook even the threat of death can be seen as something happy and enlightening. 

  About twelve years ago on an early, cold March morning I spied two greenish, ivory colored duck eggs at a live stock market in Waterloo, Illinois.  Mist was rolling off the winter wheat fields and the air smelled of cow manure and hay.  Sounds of cows mooing, horses neighing, pigs grunting, chickens clucking, and ducks quacking filled the crisp air.  The two eggs were sitting on top of a wire cage filled with mallard drakes and hens quacking inquisitively and fluttering their wings, the ducks were packed so tightly in the cages their movements almost knocked the small enclosures over. 

After a little pleading, I convinced my dad to ask for the eggs.  I decided I wanted to hatch a baby duck.  The owner of the eggs, not thinking they were fertile, (and thinking my dad was a little strange — who would want two duck eggs when you can have an actual duck, already hatched and ready to go?) gave them to my dad for free.  I was overjoyed.  When my dad and I got home we set up a small incubator (the same incubator my dad had hatched his duck in forty years earlier) for my two duck eggs.  The wait for my ducks to hatch was excruciating.

            Days and days passed until on warm afternoon late April, I found a crack in one of the eggs.  I could not have been happier, the joy I felt as a ten-year-old girl was overwhelming.  I was so thrilled one hatched, I forgot about the other, silent, motionless egg sitting next to the now empty eggshell. 

Exhausted and wet my duck wobbled around the incubator like a fish out of water.  I was amazed at its size.   This duckling was at least twice the size of the egg he had just hatched out of.  I never thought his size would hender his health — I was just happy the poor exhausted duck made it out of the egg. 

 I named him Cheerio.  A name that made perfect sense coming from the mind of a ten-year-old; a mallard hen was brown, just  like a cheerio.  So, I took a leap of faith and hoped that Cheerio was a girl, and that she would be brown, cheerio-colored hen.  Of course, fate other plans and later in life I would discover that Cheerio was in fact a boy, when he began to grow tail feathers and his head turned a greenish hue; Cheerio would be a drake.

The next day the other egg hatched; this was Hercamer.  Although a little premature she was a healthy duckling.  Ironically, I had hoped Hercarmer would be a boy, but Hercamer began to lay eggs that next spring, proving beyond a shadow of a doubt she really was a girl.

Hercamer and Cheerio were inseparable.  They  rooted through grass, swam in a child’s wading pull my dad bought at Wal-Mart, got muddy in the drainage ditch, and ate dog food right out of our labrador retriever’s bowl.  Cheerio was a pig.  Hercamer enjoyed her dog food, Cheerio would inhale it in a matter of seconds.

Cheerio became fat in no time; but I considered him to be a healthy duck.  In winter the extra fat kept him warm and in the summer he was active — until one summer a bee stung him on his foot.  This hurt Cheerio more than I expected.  I suppose the venom of a bee sting is more toxic to a duck ten times smaller than a human.  None the less Cheerio recovered, but he lived with a limp to the day he died. 

That winter Cheerio’s limp from his bee sting got worse.  Eventually, when I let the ducks out to forage, Cheerio stayed by the pen while Hercamer would go swim or root through the grass alone in the cold. Cheerio sat all day by his pen tired and lonely.  Hercamer would sit next to him most of the time, but even she had to leave her mate to preen herself in the water.

Other ducks that I had introduced to the flock (Fred, Ethel, Lucy, and Desi) considered Cheerio their ”fearless leader” (after all, he was the largest of the ducks), but, with Cheerio hurt, they were falling apart as a flock.  Desi was getting daily beatings from the other aggressive ducks (Fred and Ethel) and the aggressive ducks were getting out of control.  

If you have never been around chickens, ducks, geese, or even horses, you don’t know that these animals establish a pecking order and any minute change will disrupt the hierarchy and actually cause chaos among the animals.  So, I was contemplating getting rid of some of my precious ducks simply to eleviate the tension caused by Cheerio’s absence as the dominant leader in the pecking order.  But, ever hopeful, I kept a watchful eye on the troublemakers and kept the entire flock. 

On December 31st, 2001, Cheerio died.  He was a big duck, maybe he had an enlarged heart, and his immune system couldn’t handle the bee sting.  I miss Cheerio, and Hercamer never stopped quacking for her life-long mate, hoping he would return her forlorn pleas. 

In a way, I feel responsible for her misery since it was my intervention that changed two forgotten duck eggs into a pair of live creatures. 

However, I think of all the joy they have brought to my life and the joy they would never know, had I not done so.  I have discovered that death should be valued as much as life.  For death is the mirror that reflects the joys of life.

 I have added four more ducks to the flock since the birth of Cheerio.  Today, I look out into my two and half acre yard and see Hercamer leading a line of five ducks from digging hole to watering hole as Cheerio once did, and restoring order to the flock once again.

So.   Why am I here?  Who am I?  Is this just a place for me to express myself?  I’ve always loved writing.  Ever since I learned to write the alphabet, to hold a pencil, I was writing stories.  In fact, in first grade, after writing and illustrating a book of my own and reading it to the class, I unwittingly encouraged the rest of the class to become amateure authors.  My love and talent of writing followed me through middle school and high school, where at a rather unique private high school in an old furniture store in southern Illinois, I met the one person who would influence my writing more than anyone else.  It was there as a hormonal teenager and because of that high school english teacher that I started writing.

Now, a senior in College, majoring in animal science (I have many passions in my life, and eventually I had to chose which was the most in important, obviously, animals are closest to my heart), I’ve realized I don’t want to throw my passion to the curb.  But it’s more than that, writing is an outlet for me as woman.  I work in the science industry, a chauvanistic industry ran by men, I live in a patriarchy; names, money, as much as we deny it, everything is passed down and owned by men.  And I am just trying to find my voice as a woman.