Dispatches from the Forgotten Stars: the newsletter of author Kelly Sedinger - Issue #5
kellysedinger.substack.com
Oof. Just...oof.While this whole newsletter thing is still really new to me and I haven't really settled into a rhythm of how often I want to issue one of these, I honestly didn't plan to go this long between issues. Last weekend, though, was just not going to be a time for writing. If you follow me at all on social media or read the blog, you know that last weekend we lost our beloved greyhound, Cane, to cancer. He turned ten years old on Saturday, the 10th. On Sunday the 11th, we gathered around him, tears flowing, to say goodbye as a veterinarian gently guided him into...whatever lies beyond.Cane was our first dog as a family, and my first dog, ever. I have to admit that I was deeply skeptical of the whole "dog" thing when we got into the market for a retired racing greyhound. My entire life has been spent in the company of cats; at times, as a kid, we actually went into double-digit cats living with us. Cats, I understand. Dogs were a mystery to me. I only knew a few dogs personally, growing up; a family friend at the time had a golden shepherd who was pretty cool. A friend from school had two large dark-colored dogs, named Trixie and Flash, who were nice dogs. That friend moved away in 9th grade, though, and I honestly always viewed dogs with a bit of suspicion.When, in 2014, we finally left behind our apartment living for a house, The Wife and The Daughter both decided that we could at last have a dog. I wasn't necessarily outvoted, but I was basically of the "OK, I guess" mindset. The Wife contacted a local greyhound adoption group, after having done some homework and decided that a greyhound was for us. It took a few months for the group to find a dog for us that matched our lifestyle, and one day in September, just a couple weeks after he turned two, a big retired raced named Hurricane came to live with us. We called him Cane. It turned out that he'd been a very bad racer, coming in dead last in each of his four races.Racing's loss, it turned out, was our gain. Cane was a slow racer, but he sure got into our hearts quickly.The advice on racing greyhounds is that you have to give them a few months before their personality starts to emerge. Cane at first seemed very timid. A man on a neighboring street who lives for giving out treats to all the local dogs terrified Cane at first, for example...but eventually Cane came to love that guy to the point where he'd drag me to that driveway if he saw his friend outside. (Now Carla does this too, teaching me the power that multiple dogs pulling you can muster.)Cane loved many aspects of our lives, and he shaped our lives in equal measure. He lived for walks and car rides. If you jingled the keys, he'd jump up and dash for the door. If you rustled a plastic bag (because you might be grabbing one to bring along for clean-up duties), he'd jump up and rush to the door. If The Wife flushed the toilet, because that's the last thing she takes care of before leaving the house, he'd jump up and rush to the door.So we took Cane everywhere. He went to the Farmer's Market, and I'd take him on hiking excursions to local parks and forests on Sunday mornings. We took him several times to a big meet-up of greyhound owners in Geneva, NY that lasted an entire weekend. Letchworth Park, Taughannock Falls, Seneca Lake, Knox Farm, Chestnut Ridge, Hunter's Creek...all places Cane went and explored.I won't even try to list the foods that Cane loved, beyond his Homer Simpson-like love of donuts. Suffice it to say that many times we would be eating our dinners and we'd set aside tiny morsels that we would describe as "unfit for human consumption". And if Cane decided that we were eating our dinners too slowly, well, he would voice that opinion, too.As Cane entered his "senior" years, he did start to slow down. We couldn't hike as long or as far...but his appetite and his zest for the things he loved remained strong, just about all the way up to the end. It was the cruel unfairness of cancer that made him suffer to the point that we had to intercede. We made the appointment, and then we had to spend the next 24 hours or whatever knowing that everything we did for him was the last time.As I write this, he has been gone six days. Tomorrow is one week. Soon enough it will be two weeks, then a month, and eventually, as incomprehensible it seems right now, a year will have gone by. I wonder when the house will stop seeming so quiet, when the emptiness of his absence will stop feeling like an open wound, a violation of the very peace and comfort that is part of the concept of home in the first place. Meanwhile, we live on and we remember.I often, or even always, process things I'm feeling through the prism of stories I know. Stories are how I relate to the world, and I can often find a story someplace in my memory that illustrates some part of what I'm feeling. In this case, I remember something from the last season and episode of M*A*S*H that illustrates my feeling of this whole business of dogs and how an avowed cat-person made room in his life and heart for the canines of the world.If you don't recall M*A*S*H, it was a show set in an Army hospital (the 4077th) during the Korean War. there was a character in roughly the last half of the show's long run named Corporal Klinger. Klinger's main schtick as a character, at first, was that he hated being in Korea so much that he resorted to various schemes to convince the Army that he was insane, which would get him sent home. Among other things, Klinger took to cross-dressing, which in a late-70s, early-80s sitcom was comedy gold.Eventually, in the last season, Klinger met and fell in love with a local Korean woman, and they decided in the famous last episode of the show ("Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen") to get married. The problem was that Klinger's wife refused to leave Korea with him until she found out what became of her family there, a process which might take years, leaving Klinger on the verge of getting one wish--going home--while losing another. In a scene where, after the announcement of the war's end, all the members of the 4077th gathered for one last dinner at which they each stood and announced their post-war plans. Klinger rose last, and discussed how his love for this Korean woman left him with only one choice:"So...and I can't believe I'm saying this...I'm staying in Korea!"That's how Cane, and Carla after, made me feel. So...and I can't believe I'm saying this...I really like dogs and cats!Moving on, here are a few links to recent posts on ForgottenStars.net that I particularly like:Everybody on the bandwagon! (On the subject of the resurgent Buffalo Bills and all their newfound fans. I say, The more, the merrier! Don't let anybody gatekeep your fandom just because you weren't into the Bills when they were shuffling, zombie-like, through 6-10 seasons!)A Defense of Putting Your Elbows ON THE TABLE. (Because sometimes eating without making a giant mess is more important than some weird rule of Victorian table-manners.)"Twelve Presidents" (A repost of a short story of mine that won a local short fiction contest sixteen years ago. I still like this one!)Something for Thursday: Leonard Cohen Month begins. (In which I decided to make my weekly Thursday music posts all about Leonard Cohen this month. This project got sidetracked by Cane's passing, but for now, I rather like what I wrote about Cohen's most famous song, "Hallelujah".)STAR TREK and me. (A repost on the 56th anniversary of Star Trek's debut in 1966.)That's about all for now. Hopefully next installment will be less somber. This has, in fact, been a summer of struggles in my life. I'm hoping for a little less of that. If nothing else, The Wife and I are now two weeks out from our annual autumn trek to Ithaca and the Finger Lakes, a trip that we really need.Until next time, please give your pets a few extra hugs, treats, or gentle hand-pats.See you 'round the galaxy,--K.
Dispatches from the Forgotten Stars: the newsletter of author Kelly Sedinger - Issue #5
Dispatches from the Forgotten Stars: the…
Dispatches from the Forgotten Stars: the newsletter of author Kelly Sedinger - Issue #5
Oof. Just...oof.While this whole newsletter thing is still really new to me and I haven't really settled into a rhythm of how often I want to issue one of these, I honestly didn't plan to go this long between issues. Last weekend, though, was just not going to be a time for writing. If you follow me at all on social media or read the blog, you know that last weekend we lost our beloved greyhound, Cane, to cancer. He turned ten years old on Saturday, the 10th. On Sunday the 11th, we gathered around him, tears flowing, to say goodbye as a veterinarian gently guided him into...whatever lies beyond.Cane was our first dog as a family, and my first dog, ever. I have to admit that I was deeply skeptical of the whole "dog" thing when we got into the market for a retired racing greyhound. My entire life has been spent in the company of cats; at times, as a kid, we actually went into double-digit cats living with us. Cats, I understand. Dogs were a mystery to me. I only knew a few dogs personally, growing up; a family friend at the time had a golden shepherd who was pretty cool. A friend from school had two large dark-colored dogs, named Trixie and Flash, who were nice dogs. That friend moved away in 9th grade, though, and I honestly always viewed dogs with a bit of suspicion.When, in 2014, we finally left behind our apartment living for a house, The Wife and The Daughter both decided that we could at last have a dog. I wasn't necessarily outvoted, but I was basically of the "OK, I guess" mindset. The Wife contacted a local greyhound adoption group, after having done some homework and decided that a greyhound was for us. It took a few months for the group to find a dog for us that matched our lifestyle, and one day in September, just a couple weeks after he turned two, a big retired raced named Hurricane came to live with us. We called him Cane. It turned out that he'd been a very bad racer, coming in dead last in each of his four races.Racing's loss, it turned out, was our gain. Cane was a slow racer, but he sure got into our hearts quickly.The advice on racing greyhounds is that you have to give them a few months before their personality starts to emerge. Cane at first seemed very timid. A man on a neighboring street who lives for giving out treats to all the local dogs terrified Cane at first, for example...but eventually Cane came to love that guy to the point where he'd drag me to that driveway if he saw his friend outside. (Now Carla does this too, teaching me the power that multiple dogs pulling you can muster.)Cane loved many aspects of our lives, and he shaped our lives in equal measure. He lived for walks and car rides. If you jingled the keys, he'd jump up and dash for the door. If you rustled a plastic bag (because you might be grabbing one to bring along for clean-up duties), he'd jump up and rush to the door. If The Wife flushed the toilet, because that's the last thing she takes care of before leaving the house, he'd jump up and rush to the door.So we took Cane everywhere. He went to the Farmer's Market, and I'd take him on hiking excursions to local parks and forests on Sunday mornings. We took him several times to a big meet-up of greyhound owners in Geneva, NY that lasted an entire weekend. Letchworth Park, Taughannock Falls, Seneca Lake, Knox Farm, Chestnut Ridge, Hunter's Creek...all places Cane went and explored.I won't even try to list the foods that Cane loved, beyond his Homer Simpson-like love of donuts. Suffice it to say that many times we would be eating our dinners and we'd set aside tiny morsels that we would describe as "unfit for human consumption". And if Cane decided that we were eating our dinners too slowly, well, he would voice that opinion, too.As Cane entered his "senior" years, he did start to slow down. We couldn't hike as long or as far...but his appetite and his zest for the things he loved remained strong, just about all the way up to the end. It was the cruel unfairness of cancer that made him suffer to the point that we had to intercede. We made the appointment, and then we had to spend the next 24 hours or whatever knowing that everything we did for him was the last time.As I write this, he has been gone six days. Tomorrow is one week. Soon enough it will be two weeks, then a month, and eventually, as incomprehensible it seems right now, a year will have gone by. I wonder when the house will stop seeming so quiet, when the emptiness of his absence will stop feeling like an open wound, a violation of the very peace and comfort that is part of the concept of home in the first place. Meanwhile, we live on and we remember.I often, or even always, process things I'm feeling through the prism of stories I know. Stories are how I relate to the world, and I can often find a story someplace in my memory that illustrates some part of what I'm feeling. In this case, I remember something from the last season and episode of M*A*S*H that illustrates my feeling of this whole business of dogs and how an avowed cat-person made room in his life and heart for the canines of the world.If you don't recall M*A*S*H, it was a show set in an Army hospital (the 4077th) during the Korean War. there was a character in roughly the last half of the show's long run named Corporal Klinger. Klinger's main schtick as a character, at first, was that he hated being in Korea so much that he resorted to various schemes to convince the Army that he was insane, which would get him sent home. Among other things, Klinger took to cross-dressing, which in a late-70s, early-80s sitcom was comedy gold.Eventually, in the last season, Klinger met and fell in love with a local Korean woman, and they decided in the famous last episode of the show ("Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen") to get married. The problem was that Klinger's wife refused to leave Korea with him until she found out what became of her family there, a process which might take years, leaving Klinger on the verge of getting one wish--going home--while losing another. In a scene where, after the announcement of the war's end, all the members of the 4077th gathered for one last dinner at which they each stood and announced their post-war plans. Klinger rose last, and discussed how his love for this Korean woman left him with only one choice:"So...and I can't believe I'm saying this...I'm staying in Korea!"That's how Cane, and Carla after, made me feel. So...and I can't believe I'm saying this...I really like dogs and cats!Moving on, here are a few links to recent posts on ForgottenStars.net that I particularly like:Everybody on the bandwagon! (On the subject of the resurgent Buffalo Bills and all their newfound fans. I say, The more, the merrier! Don't let anybody gatekeep your fandom just because you weren't into the Bills when they were shuffling, zombie-like, through 6-10 seasons!)A Defense of Putting Your Elbows ON THE TABLE. (Because sometimes eating without making a giant mess is more important than some weird rule of Victorian table-manners.)"Twelve Presidents" (A repost of a short story of mine that won a local short fiction contest sixteen years ago. I still like this one!)Something for Thursday: Leonard Cohen Month begins. (In which I decided to make my weekly Thursday music posts all about Leonard Cohen this month. This project got sidetracked by Cane's passing, but for now, I rather like what I wrote about Cohen's most famous song, "Hallelujah".)STAR TREK and me. (A repost on the 56th anniversary of Star Trek's debut in 1966.)That's about all for now. Hopefully next installment will be less somber. This has, in fact, been a summer of struggles in my life. I'm hoping for a little less of that. If nothing else, The Wife and I are now two weeks out from our annual autumn trek to Ithaca and the Finger Lakes, a trip that we really need.Until next time, please give your pets a few extra hugs, treats, or gentle hand-pats.See you 'round the galaxy,--K.