pets

Night Night Tinks

~ ChanAtkins ~ 5 Comments

You were the best girl ever…

Tinks just before the end – image is mine

Of course, we knew it was coming. Of course we had seen her slow down. As she turned 14 in February, I celebrated the fact she was the oldest dog I’d ever had! My last two died at aged 10 due to heart failure, and aged 13 after a stroke. But at 14, she was still going, still clicking about on her increasingly weak and wobbly legs, still emitting her strange high-pitched woof every time she wanted something, still causing no trouble, still being the sweetest, gentlest girl ever…

In April I celebrated again. Fourteen years had passed since I agreed to squeeze in an extra foster dog, and had this tiny mucky little scrap of a thing handed over the garden gate to me. Already named Tinkerbelle, I stuck her in the sink for her first bath. She settled in like she owned the place; always calm, sweet, and optimistic, even as a tiny pup.

No one phoned up for her, there was no interest in this smooth coated brindle lurcher pup at all and then one day she managed to climb up onto the kitchen side to try and reach some food. She fell off and broke her back leg. This, of course, meant an extended foster stay with us, during which numerous other rescue dogs came and went to their new homes. On the day someone finally phoned up to ask about her, I knew I could not let her go. She was ours. She had been with us for too long and there was no way we could give her up now.

Tinks as a puppy with her broken leg in a cast – image is mine

Tinks was the perfect puppy. While still in a cast, she slept every night in a crate to keep her as still as possible and she never complained. Once her cast came off, she could start going for walks but was still happy to sleep downstairs every night. She rarely peed in the house, rarely nipped anyone as a small pup, and although not particularly interested in training or tricks, Tinkerbelle always had reliable recall and always greeted other dogs politely and sensibly. And as the months wore on, her smooth brindle coat grew long and fluffy!

Tinks – first walk without her cast on! Image is mine

We were so, so lucky.

As the years went by, Tinks only got easier. I have never had such an easy dog. She was vocal when she wanted to be, but only ever out of excitement. She never jumped up at anyone, never stole food, never destroyed anything. She was so happy-go-lucky, so laidback. I always said it was like she lived in her own little world, and she did. A sweet, gentle happy little Tinks world.

Tinks as a puppy – image is mine

At the start of 2020, before the pandemic, we said goodbye to Skipper, another lurcher. He was ten and had suffered with heart failure for the last year of his life. He was a great companion for Tinks – they truly loved eachother and when he was put to sleep at home, she was there too. As I leaned over him, sobbing, she came over, pushed her head up under my arm and forced me to look at her. It was as if she was trying to say, hey, I’m still here!

Not long after Skipper left us, we got Jesse, who is now 5. He gave Tinks a new lease of life, as did Ada when she came along almost three years ago.

me and Tinks – image is mine

It’s really been the last year or so that Tinks started to slow down. Her back legs in particular were getting shakier and weaker, and she had trouble going up and down stairs. She stopped coming out for so many walks and was mostly happy pottering around the garden.

We knew the end was coming and I wanted the end that Skipper had. He was always afraid of the vets and became stressed getting into cars, so we had the vets come out to us. That way he could slip away in the comfort of his own home.

The Sunday before last, Tinks was fine one moment and then I noticed she was panting heavily. It was 6pm and we were watching TV together. She then got up and staggered about on her bed, so I went over to her, as something did not seem right. As I reached her, her legs gave way under her and she collapsed mostly into my arms, but hit her head on the floor. As she went down, her mouth stretched open and she cried out in pain. I thought I was losing her there and then.

We got her comfortable and all gathered around her, crying. She couldn’t seem to move her legs so we gently moved them for her so she was lying on her side. About an hour later she had another similar episode. She got up, staggered about, fell onto my lap and cried out. This time it was worse and she cried and grunted several times and again, I was certain she was going.

She settled down again and I called the emergency vets as I did not want her to suffer. They couldn’t send anyone out at that time but could see her if we drove her in. That would have been difficult, as she was a big dog who couldn’t move by herself at this point. We discussed it but by 9pm she seemed okay again. She had some water and even a few treats. We decided to leave her for the night and see how things were in the morning.

I slept downstairs with her that night. She slept peacefully through and in the morning surprised us all by going outside for a wee! She didn’t want any food though. Meanwhile, I made the appointment for the vets to come out on the Wednesday, as it was clear we couldn’t let this go on much longer. It gave us a few more days with her and I was thankful for that, but also anxious in case she had another episode. I just didn’t want her to suffer at all.

Thankfully she made it to Wednesday. She did not eat any dog food, just the odd treat and a tiny bit of cake I shared with her. She drank water but was otherwise uninterested in food. She slept peacefully most of the time and we all tried to spend as much time with her as we could.

Wednesday arrived. My busiest work day, but to be honest, I was glad of the distraction. I ran a few Zoom clubs in the morning then the vets arrived at 12.30pm. It was all over very quickly and very peacefully. She was so tired, so weak, so ready to go. My teenage son was here and he was wonderful. We buried her in the garden next to Skipper on the other side of the cherry tree.

Mostly, I feel relief. Life was getting harder for her, and I really wanted to avoid a stressful or painful death. She deserved the best end and I think that’s what she got. No more suffering, no more pain, no more feeling tired or weak.

And now, we miss her.

We realise how special she was, how sweet she was, how easy she was. She never demanded anything of anyone, that’s the thing I keep coming back to. She was the least demanding dog I’ve ever had. The simplest. The gentlest. The easiest.

Fourteen years is a long time for a dog to be part of your life and your family. Though we have the younger two to keep us busy, there is a Tink shaped hole in everything now.

But what I keep coming back to is how lucky we were to have her. From an extra foster dog I didn’t know I was getting, to the broken leg meaning her foster stay was prolonged, to having her as part of our lives for so very long, I feel lucky.

Night night sweet Tinks.

Thank you for being the best girl ever.

Stay Home – A Year of Writing Through Lockdown

~ ChanAtkins ~ 2 Comments

It’s finally here!

Stay Home – A Year of Writing Through Lockdown is the first book published by the Community Interest Company myself and author Sim Alec Sansford run, Chasing Driftwood Writing Group. The book has been published under Chasing Driftwood Books and we hope there will be many more to come. In fact, we will be annoucning a brand new community writing project very soon!

So, what is Stay Home about and why did we put it together?

At the start of the Covid 19 pandemic, I turned almost daily to my blog to write about my fears and experiences as a nationwide lockdown saw the closing of schools, colleges and workplaces. The majority of us stayed home. We watched the world from our windows, took our daily walks, and turned to music, books and streaming services to entertain us. We also turned to gardening, pets and chicken-keeping! For a short while, our lives stopped and a new reality took over. As my blog posts and ponderings piled up, I decided to open up my blog to guests who might want to share their thoughts, feelings and experiences of life under lockdown. I had in mind at this point that putting together an anthology to publish under Chasing Driftwood would be a good plan. So, we opened it up to even more people, including the adults and children who attend our writing clubs and workshops.

We were overwhelmed by the wonderful submissions of personal essays, stories and poetry and we soon had a decent sized anthology on our hands.

It’s been a great learning experience for myself and Sim. Of course, as self-published authors ourselves we understand the process of compiling a manuscript, formatting, editing, proofreading, choosing a front cover and uploading to Amazon, but there were still new things to learn along the way. We would like to publish more anthologies in the future written by the people we work with, so Stay Home was a fantastic opportunity to learn from.

It has been published under Chasing Driftwood Books and is available now in ebook and paperback from Amazon. All the money from book sales will go back into the CIC to help fund our next community writing project. If you re interested in reading the book and supporting emerging writers and our next project, then here is the link to check it out.

mybook.to/StayHome

A huge thank you to all the wonderful contributors and to artist Law Baker who kindly designed the front cover for us!

Guest Post #4 Pandemic Pets – How Are Furry Friends Saved Our Sanity

~ ChanAtkins ~ 2 Comments

Welcome to another Pandemic Pets feature! Each week I will be welcoming a guest to the blog to tell us how the furry friends in their life have made getting through the Covid 19 pandemic that much easier. Please welcome YA author KM. Allan who tells us how her new kitten Dash helped fill the hole left by her previous writing buddy, Slinky.

How Having A Pet During The Pandemic Made Things Joyful

When lockdown began in Australia during March, I’d had my new kitten Dash for only a few weeks. He wasn’t a lockdown pet, but a cat I’d been waiting to get for a few months, having lost my last cat, Slinky, to cancer 2 years prior. I’d had her for 15 years and was looking forward to having another furry companion and a new writing buddy.

Slinky – writing buddy

That first lockdown lasted from March until June. Then we had a second lockdown in July that’s still ongoing, although the harshest of restrictions eased last month. Having spent 7 months of the year in lockdown—mostly at home for 23 hours a day—you get to know a kitten pretty well.

While Dash spends a good amount of time sleeping, he’s also playful. Sometimes that playfulness happens at 3am and I wake to find him trying to steal my pillow, but it has made lockdown more bearable.

I tried to keep a routine during this time and stick to writing with the #6amAusWriters on Twitter, and this became part of Dash’s routine too. He’d get up with me and sit near the desk, often stealing my chair (until I got him his own) and would keep me company on cold winter mornings. It even got to the point where he’d wake me if I didn’t get up when my alarm went off (yes, really. And his idea of an alarm is biting me!)

Dash – writing buddy

While I didn’t get a pet to help me through lockdown, I wonder what it would have been like without one. I probably would have checked the news more often, letting the sadness of the world get to me more than it did. I wouldn’t have taken breaks through the day to throw soft balls around and marvel at how high a kitten can jump, and I wouldn’t have discovered how much Ragdoll cats are like dogs and will play fetch with you.

I would have known what it was like to pass the Groundhog Day sameness of lockdown by doing a puzzle without a cat stealing the pieces, but I wouldn’t have arranged boxes from online orders into cat tunnels or upgraded to a cat play system. I got to do those things during a time when we’ve all done things we probably thought we wouldn’t.

Dash – box tunnels

It was, and still is, a hard year to cope with, and I’m glad that I had a pet to help me through it.

Dash wasn’t just there on the days when all the creativity I could muster was to set Netflix to binge. He was also there when I achieved milestones like publishing my first two books.

In a year when being a debut author meant missing out on bookstore events, in-person launches, and celebrations in restaurants with family and friends, having a cat who was just as excited as me to open a box of my published books was fun. Okay, so for him, it might have been about a new box and not the books, but I’ll always smile when I see the picture of Dash nosing his way into the carton.

An event that didn’t pan out like I thought it would because of 2020 was still joyful, and it and many more events throughout year were, simply because I had a pet to share them with during the pandemic.

Thank you so much to Kate for joining us on The Glorious Outsiders and introducing us to the gorgeous Dash! It sounds like having him around really helped the strict lockdowns become more bearable. If you would like to know more about KM Allan and her books her links are below! And if you would like to write a personal piece, story or poem on the Pandemic Pets theme please get in touch!

K.M. Allan is an identical twin, but not the evil one. She started her career penning beauty articles for a hairstyling website and now powers herself with chocolate and green tea while she writes novels and blogs about writing.

When she’s not creating YA stories full of hidden secrets, nightmares, and powerful magic, she likes to read, binge-watch too much TV, spend time with family, and take more photos than she will ever humanly need.

Visit her website, http://www.kmallan.com, to discover the mysteries of the universe. Or at the very least, some good writing tips.

Guest Post #3 – Pandemic Pets – How Our Furry Friends Saved Our Sanity

~ ChanAtkins ~ 1 Comment

Welcome to another Pandemic Pets feature! Each week I will be welcoming a guest to the blog to tell us how the furry friends in their life have made getting through the Covid 19 pandemic that much easier. Please welcome author Val Portelli who has a fascinating tale to tell about some unusual lockdown visitors!

I love animals, except meeces, I hate meeces. I’m not sure why they make me neurotic; they’re tiny, supposedly more scared of me than I am of them, and it’s not as if they can harm me. Although I’d be worried if I came face to face with a charging lion, at least that would be logical. My first lockdown visitor was a mouse. My personal supply of cheese and chocolate diminished rapidly in an effort to tempt him into oblivion, but he was a clever-clogs and managed to avoid or jump over traps and sticky things.

It was as well we were not allowed visitors as they would have had hysterics at the sight of me banging on the kitchen door before opening it, and yelling, ‘I’m coming mouse, hide, I don’t want to see you. Alright?’

Sometimes he listened, sometimes I didn’t bang loud enough and saw him scuttling into a corner, while I shook in fright. With the aid of my household cavalry, I plucked up courage to re-enter the kitchen, but even when they saw him scuttle off, there was no way he could have squeezed into the tiny gap between the floor and the cupboard under the sink. Where had he gone? Was it in fact a ghost mouse come to haunt me?

I’ve always loved dogs and when I was growing up, they were part of the family. It didn’t seem fair to have one when I first bought my own property, and was out at work all day, but fate intervened. A casual visit to some friends with my fiancé resulted in us coming home with a bundle of mischief I named Pacer, after the character in one of my favourite Elvis films. Our friends had holiday-sat a Labrador who had got frivolous with their Alsatian and somehow a puppy ended up coming home with us. We had nothing ready for the new addition but for the next seventeen years Pacer was part of our household.

‘No more dogs,’ I said, when he went over the rainbow bridge. ‘Holiday arrangements are impossible, they want walkies even if it’s snowing on Christmas day, the house is always a mess and losing them breaks your heart.’

Six weeks later Mij, a staff mongrel, took up residence and was the boss for another sixteen years. When he joined Pacer, I realised that apart from a few weeks, the house had never been without a canine presence, and I had no-one to blame if it was untidy.

Next to appear on the scene was ‘Cheeky.’ This was a fox who appeared in my garden one day, and decided I was a soft touch. Over time he realised the chairs in the conservatory were quite comfortable, and they still bear the claw marks from where he wriggled down for a snooze. He would eat from my hand, and wander about as if he owned the place. Sometimes when I was engrossed in writing, I would look up and find him next to my desk in the office, but I’m not sure how impressed he was when my first book was published.

He was followed by Chico and Rosie, who visited regularly for a few years. Chico was the larger and more confident of the two, but woe betide him if he tried to snatch all the goodies. Rosie would give him a tongue lashing and put him firmly in his place. I was sad when I returned from a few week’s holiday and they didn’t appear. I hope they had found alternative lodgings, but as by then they were quite elderly perhaps they had gone to join their predecessors. For a while there were no animals around as restricted mobility meant I was unable to have more dogs who needed exercise, and the house felt empty.

Around the time the virus hit, I noticed a new fox in the garden who ran off as soon as I appeared. A box of cheapo chicken wings went on the shopping list, and Spiro became a regular visitor. What was surprising was his size seemed to alter slightly, but that might have been because of the dark evenings and his fur being flattened by the rain. It took a while to build up his confidence, but gradually, instead of leaping the fence as soon as I appeared, he would sit and wait for me.

The mystery was solved when he came for dinner late one afternoon while it was still light, and through the trees I noticed another face watching. There were two of them! No, actually three! Spiro was very slightly larger, but the twins, Lucy and Luca were identical. I now had to buy giant sized packs of chicken, to feed the growing family. Although I wasn’t responsible for the great toilet roll shortage of 2020, a lack of chicken wings in the shops might have been down to them. Lucy was the most nervous of the three, and it became a game to ensure they all had their share. As the most confident, Spiro would grab one piece, then sprint back for the two others before she got a look-in. Luca would often take one off him, leaving Lucy with nothing.

I wonder if the neighbours thought I had totally lost the plot through Lockdown if they heard me calling ‘Come on, quick. Before the others get back. I’m not going to hurt you, but if you don’t learn to trust me, you’re going to starve,’ especially as it looked as if I was talking to the tree.

Although I live fairly close to the city of London, it made me appreciate the joys of having a garden. The menagerie currently comprises three foxes, one occasional squirrel, the odd jackdaw, a pair of magpies, and various roaming neighbourhood cats. I seem to have taken on the role of referee, often having to break up fights by clapping my hands at 3 o’clock in the morning, and threatening them if they don’t quieten down. Like stroppy teenagers, they’ve also learnt to answer back. I’m not expert in speaking fox, and hope they are saying ‘Thank you,’ but I have a sneaking suspicion when they stand and bark it me, it’s actually ‘We’re hungry. What kept you?’

With love from the crazy lockdown fox lady.

© Val Portelli November 2020

A huge thank you to Val for this gorgeous piece and beautiful photos of the foxes. My sister was also visited by an urban fox during lockdown, one that has become so friendly it enters their house to take food. I’m trying to persuade her to write about it for my blog! If you are interested in finding out more about Val and her books her links are below. If you would like to write a personal piece, story or poem on the subject of Pandemic Pets then please get in touch!

Val’s Amazon page: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Val-Portelli/e/B08272K1R4?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1607110915&sr=8-1