Author: Lori Romano

I am a writer, photographer, mother, dog owner, half-assed housekeeper and a self-proclaimed coffee and chocolate addict. One day, I will write a book.

What can I say about Duane?

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It’s been a week since my dad’s funeral. No, it hasn’t really sunk in yet that he’s gone. How could it? Duane was always larger than life, one of those people you just can’t talk or think about without smiling–maybe because you’re remembering one of the racy jokes he used to tell.

It’s hard to write about Duane…there’s just too much to say. Every thought of him leads to a story that leads to another memory that leads to another person that leads to another story. It makes it hard to figure out where to start (and it feels impossible to share it all). And Duane was a guy who loved a good story.

Duane knew everyone and everyone’s stories. He collected them, catalogued them, filed them away. He knew everyone and their stories because he cared. He knew people’s stories because people mattered to him. And the funny thing about Duane is that it didn’t make a difference whether he knew you for 30 seconds or 30 years, no matter how/when/why you found your way into his orbit, the result was always the same–he would CARE about you. You’d start out sharing a drink or an elevator ride and then the next thing you know you’re borrowing his truck to move into your apartment or watching him adjust your son’s training wheels because he noticed they were a little wobbly when he rode by on the sidewalk.

Duane was a person who left everything better than he found it. Every house or apartment we ever lived in was cleaner when we left than when we moved in. Every person Duane met or talked to always walked away in a better mood, with a better outlook, or with a funny (and slightly inappropriate) story to share. This world is a better place because Duane was in it, and that was made clear in his final days, as I watched friends and family and near-strangers flock to his side to say goodbye.

It makes you think a lot about life, to see your father there bravely facing the end of it–watching the aides and nurses and therapists and doctors staying late and coming in on their days off, telling him that they loved him, squeezing his hands, kissing him on the forehead.

It makes you think about what is most important in this life as you sit with someone you love through their last days. And while I’ve often said that the thing I value most in this life is connection (and that I truly believe the one purpose we all share here as humans is to find ways to connect with each other), I think the power of human connection has never been so clear and powerful for me than what I’ve witnessed in these last days, weeks, months since Duane went to the hospital for the last time.

Duane loved life. He LOVED life. No matter how beautiful or brutal or complicated or challenging, Duane was down for the ride. And even after the cancer diagnoses and the difficult surgeries, he didn’t really slow down much at all. He was determined to squeeze every last drop out of this life and move onto the next on his own terms–and I’ll be damned if that’s not exactly what he did. I always knew my dad was strong–working as hard as he always did, raising Lindy and I, dealing with his own obstacles and life lessons and losses, graduating to grandparenthood, navigating all the health challenges, etc.–but somehow everything he endured before now seems so small compared to the things he faced these last few months.

For almost three months, we watched Duane get sick, recover, relapse, keep fighting, go on hospice, go off hospice, go on a ventilator, go to rehab, refuse to give up, and then finally surrender. He tried everything, exhausted every opportunity, never gave up, right up to the moment when he told us it was time to go. And I think, out of everything, I am most thankful for that extra time, because it gave us a chance to make his last day his best day, so we could come together and let him go.

We prayed and took communion. He shared a cold 6-pack of Busch Light and Dot’s honey mustard pretzels with Harry and Stevie and Thorin. He dictated all his wishes for a simple graveside service and luncheon to Mom, with a handful of other instructions for after he was gone. Lindy and Richard and Odin and Henry came after school. Cadence said her goodbye to Papa the day before. Jim and Cindy arrived, and Jim mixed Duane his first Windsor & 7 in months. Then the four friends settled in to watch the Husker women’s volleyball team take down Indiana. We all laughed a bit and cried some too. One by one, we all said our goodbyes.

One of the things I find most remarkable about my dad is that for all the genuine care and love he put out into this world, he never really said it: “I love you.” If I’m being totally honest here, I don’t know if I never heard my dad say those words. I would joke with him about it sometimes, trying to illicit some reaction or make some sense out of why those words always seemed elusive.

Duane never said “I love you” but he showed it in a million ways, and anyone who ever knew him can probably tell a story about how my dad showed up, helped out, or just listened or gave advice when they needed it most. He always wanted everyone to leave a little better than they came in. He made sure everyone was taken care of, no matter what. He never said, “I love you.” It was always a finger wave and a “Yep, I’ll see ya.” But somehow, even if he never came right out and said it, he always had a way of making everybody feel like they were the most important people in the world. And we saw so much of that love come back to him as so many gathered last week to pay their respects and welcome him home. (Smartest decision Mom and I made was to upgrade to the big room at the Bertrand Community Building…I just had a feeling there might be a few people who needed to tell my dad goodbye).

That last night, I needed him to know that I loved him. I needed him to know that I knew he loved me too. So I waited until we had a quiet moment in the room together before I left. I knelt down beside the bed and touched his arm.

“I love you, Dad” I said. “We all love you. You know that right?”

He nodded and reached for his electro-larnyx. Then he said, “I wasn’t ever much good at saying it.”

I nodded.

“Maybe you never said it, but you showed it in a million ways. Remember when I would drive home from college? I’d always wake up the next morning and my car would be in the shop for an oil change and a tune-up, and the tank was always miraculously full of gas.” He smirked and nodded. I went on. “And remember the chairs you bought me after I had Cadence and Henry? You were worried about me being able to get up off the couch after my surgeries, you insisted I have the right chairs to recuperate.”

We were both crying then, and it was time to go. I told him I loved him and I kissed him on the forehead. He waved a finger at me and smiled.

“Yep, I’ll see ya.”

I’m not a religious person. It’s not for lack of trying. I just can’t seem to find one that holds sacred everything I do…no exceptions or exclusions. So, I always settle for just saying I’m spiritual and that I believe in something so much bigger than me and all of us that includes and embraces and IS all of us (and then at that point even I start getting kinda dizzy, so I just leave it at that and move on). But ask me right now, this moment, how I KNOW that there is something so much bigger than this and that death is not something to fear because it’s not really an “end.” Ask me how I know death is just a temporary interruption, a small glitch, a thin veiled passage between this place to something else. I know this, because when I said goodbye to Duane that night (and we both knew it was the last time we were saying goodbye in this place), when I told him I loved him and said good night, he smiled and waved a finger and said with absolute certainty, “Yep, I’ll see ya.”

Yep, I’ll see ya, Duane. And until it’s my time to join that epic party I have no doubts you’re now busy orchestrating in the place we all graduate to after this, all I hope is that I can spend my precious time here making this life and this world better than I found it and taking good care of the people around me…just like you showed me how to do.

CLICK HERE to watch Duane’s graveside service. And if you have a memory you’d like to share, feel free to leave it in the comments or email it to lori.romano07@gmail.com.

My thoughts on the overturn of Roe v. Wade

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I am a woman who stands in the very intersection of this pro-life/pro-choice debate, so I feel moved today to share my thoughts on what happened today as the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. I mean, it’s not every day the government of your country votes to make you and all the other millions of women into second class citizens. It’s not every day you are told you don’t matter, not if you have a uterus. Nope. If you have a uterus, only your uterus matters…and the government just better go ahead and decide exactly how that uterus gets to exist, how that uterus will be used, and how that uterus will quickly be forgotten (along with the rest of you), when it’s no longer working the way the government thinks it should.

I have a unique perspective on this one…maybe one that a lot of people on both sides of this issue may be unable to see or articulate. I was adopted as an infant, born to a mother who was just 15. She chose life for me, because even at that tender age, even with a mountain of hardships in her life that would have made it impossible for her to keep me and provide the kind of life she thought I deserved, she also understood that she had some privileges she could leverage, too. She was a young, healthy girl who had the support of her family to get her though the pregnancy and the trauma of birth and placing me for adoption.

I’m going to stop and say that again, because I need you take a moment and really hear me—the trauma of birth and placing her baby for adoption.

Because even in the best of circumstances, and I would honestly say mine are pretty close to the “best of circumstances”—where a healthy young woman had some support and access to good food, a roof over her head, and some prenatal care—there is still a deep and undeniable trauma that comes as a result of the separation of mother and child. Period. Most people don’t like to talk about that, let alone create and fund the support services needed to help the mother and child AND adoptive families deal with that trauma. But you don’t ever hear anyone talk about that when they lift adoption as the beautiful, ideal solution for those mothers who are unable to take the best care of these babies they are compelled to have. It also doesn’t seem like mothers matter enough in this country to even warrant actual maternity leave to allow the time needed for their bodies to heal and recover after growing and birthing a brand new human. I was still bleeding and in pain from my c-sections when I had to return to work, and I used up every scrap of paid and unpaid leave I was allowed to take.

So here is one of my mothers, faced with an impossible situation, and she had to make the best decision she could for her and her unborn child. She chose to give up part of herself and her life to give me mine. And that should be her choice, and hers alone.

Her body. Her life. Her choice.

My other mother, my adoptive mother, was older, married, relatively financially stable, and longing for a family. She had three miscarriages trying to conceive and carry a baby to term. She and my dad got close, once, and there’s an old photo album and tiny gravesite to mark the pain of their loss. They decided then to adopt, and were able to adopt my sister and I just 1 year and 16 days apart. It sounds like the best possible situation for everyone, and I will agree it truly was the best possible situation because I’m here, right? I’ve had this life.

But all of it came at a cost to all of us, and the effects rippled through our families. And yes, while overall, I will always be positive about what I have had and experienced in this life of mine, it hasn’t been free of pain or heartbreak or sorrow. All three of us have experienced the absolute best and worst of this world because we’ve had this shot at life together, but ALL of that came because both of these women came, in some way, from those privileged places where they had the means and the support and the safety nets they needed to make those choices.

Most women in this country today DO NOT have those privileges and support and safety nets. Many women in this country don’t have access to nutritious food, safe places to live, jobs to support themselves and their families, equal access to education, even basic healthcare. Many women don’t have the means to support a child—financially, physically, emotionally. And that doesn’t even begin to touch on the complications that come from situations where a woman is raped, or when a hopeful expectant mother is told her baby is suffering from a genetic disorder or a life-threatening disease that could endanger her life too, if carried to term.

In some states, even miscarriages could be deemed “illegal” now. So my adoptive mother, with all of her best intentions to have the American Dream of getting married and having a job and starting a family—even she becomes a villain, a criminal, in this new world we’re living in today after the Supreme Court’s ruling. I have to hope that some of those Justices just didn’t think all of this through before they voted as they did. The alternative—that they had thought through these scenarios, and still voted the way they did—would make me seriously question both their sanity and their motives.

And then there’s this whole unimagined scenario where my birthmother decided to keep me. At 15, she may have had to drop out of high school—or at least college would have been out of the question (which she started after I was adopted, but is still trying to finish today after stopping out when my half-siblings were born a few years later).

And my birthfather? He’s a wonderful man, and his family were good, hardworking people, but they were poor, and he was just 17 when I was born. His football talent offered a scholarship to college, which he may have had to forfeit if he took on the role of full-time dad.

So maybe before we decide that EVERY woman in this country should be forced to bring EVERY pregnancy to term to bring as many babies as possible into this world because, “Yea! Babies! We love babies!”, we should actually think what essential systems must be in place so we can, as one large human community of the United States of America, ensure that ALL babies have access to what they need to survive and thrive and become well-adjusted, supported, productive, accepted, and genuinely cared for members of society.

Maybe we should keep our politics off each others’ bodies altogether. Unless, of course, along with this strict control over the output of every uterus in this country, there also comes a 2-for-1 deal on vasectomies for every penis. We want to keep things fair, don’t we, because we’re all in this together, right? For the babies?

I’m home with laryngitis. My voice literally just disappeared yesterday. And when I went to the doctor, she told me I needed to just rest and not talk for a couple days, so I was camped out on the couch at home working and sending emails and joking with my colleagues that the universe was telling me to be still, be quiet, when the news broke. And it started to dawn on me as I felt the anger rising and the words itching to come out, that maybe the universe knew I needed to be home for this, because it hits me at home in deeply personal ways—as an adopted child, a sexual assault survivor, the mother of a young daughter, and a woman still of reproductive age with hella white privilege in this country at this stage and station in my life where I have a good job, decent financial security, a big supportive family, a community of friends who are just as close as family, reasonable access to healthcare, a home, a car, health insurance, and two beautiful children who were wanted, planned, and a choice that all of those other privileges allowed me to make in order to bring these two beautiful lives into the world.

But what kind of world did I bring these beautiful lives into?

Is it a world well-prepared and able (and willing) to come together as one large community to help those precious lives feel loved and cared for? Is it a community where ALL of the beautiful, precious lives are celebrated and included and supported to be the best, most authentic versions of themselves? Because that’s why we want them to be born in the first place, right? To BE exactly who they are? Because to want them to be anything but EXACTLY who they are isn’t really protecting their “right to life” is it?

Whew! Okay, good. Glad we could take a second and clear that one up for all the folks in our country who are feeling unseen, uncared for, unappreciated, discriminated against, targeted, or encouraged/required to show up in this world as anything other than their beautiful, uniquely authentic selves. Thanks! We’ll be sure to be on the lookout for the rulings and the laws to make sure that happens…though someone might want to get Justice Clarence Thomas on the same page, because it sounds like he’s already looking to ban the contraception that allowed me to plan my pregnancies so I could give my babies and myself the best possible lives. Oh, and while he’s at it, he’s already talking about taking away rights from same-sex couples, which would pretty much decimate their right to live their lives as the actual humans they were born to be. Let’s see if we can get on the same page there too, while we’re at it, okay?

But this isn’t just an issue that hits hard at home for me. It’s an issue that hits at work, too, because I sit with students in those moments when they get assaulted and have to worry about the possibility of an unwanted pregnancy on top of the trauma they just endured and haven’t even begun to process yet. I sit with students who learn they’re pregnant and suddenly realize their immediate future is falling apart…but they don’t have time for that. They’ve got decisions to make because the clock is ticking if they even happen to live in a state that allows them the possibility of having an abortion.

And does it soften the blow that word—abortion—tends to have on folks if we throw in circumstances like the student is poor and the pregnancy was the result of abuse, only compounding the trauma of the abuse with more trauma if she is forced to carry the abusers’ child to term, and then attempt to place the baby for adoption?

And we haven’t even touched on the effects of gestational trauma that babies experience in utero, or the effects generational trauma this child will carry with them into their adoptive family, who have all of their own experiences and traumas.

Sounds like fun, doesn’t it? And a really healthy environment for everyone involved.

This country is poised in a very precarious position, where they could either start making some massive mistakes (the first of which happened today when the U.S. Supreme Court abolished Roe v. Wade and stripped all humans with uteruses the right to make decisions about their own bodies, regardless of their wants or needs or privileges or lack thereof, which, if I’m not mistaken, is sort of a twisted violation of their own “right to life” now isn’t it?) And it hits me that maybe the universe silenced me today so I’d pick up my pen instead, because maybe someone like me on a day like this might have something important to say, maybe even something worth listening to.

Because just as we are poised at the edge of one of the most colossal failures in the history of human existence, I think maybe we’re also poised at the edge of this incredible, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity too. An opportunity to actually get this whole life thing right for ALL of us for a change. ALL humans. And maybe even every other creature on this living, breathing planet we have been entrusted to care for, too, so it can, in turn, support and sustain our existence…and all these babies!

I think it’s truly our CHOICE where we ALL go from here.

So if you are a human with a uterus, or perhaps more importantly, if you are a person who loves a human with a uterus, it’s time to pay attention, to rise up, to speak out, and to start making some choices of your own that can lead us closer to that world where every human with a “right to life” has the right to a life worth living in the first place. A world where we will, as one large community, care for each other and for those babies longer after they’re babies, because that “right to life” can’t matter at conception and then suddenly NOT matter after birth. That just doesn’t make any sense, does it?

Here’s the truth I see from where I’m sitting—we humans could do some really incredible, meaningful shit if we focused our attention and intentions on the kind of life we can create for each other and those precious babies OUTSIDE the womb. We sure spend a lot more time out here, don’t we? Seems like it might be a pretty great return on investment if we stop and really collectively think about that for a moment, and then come together, collaborate, support each other, love each other exactly as we are, and make it happen.

Maybe that’s the work that starts tomorrow.

I’m ready. Who’s in?

This isn’t rocket science

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I was listening to a podcast in the car on the way to work today, and I heard something that got me thinking.

“This isn’t rocket science…”

How many times have we heard people say that (have we said it ourselves) and then launch into some comparison with something they think should be simple. I heard it today and it struck me that we have things a little backwards. We say, “This isn’t rocket science” implying rocket science is the most difficult, complex, challenging thing that exists in our world.

Don’t misunderstand, I’m not here to say rocket science is easy. No way. I’m not even going to pretend I know anything about it. But I would like to point out that we have actually figured it out. We’ve launched rockets, lots of rockets, many of them successfully. We’ve put men on the moon, sent people to explore space, put satellites in orbit, sent rovers to Mars. At this rate, I’d say we actually have a pretty great grasp on rocket science.

“This isn’t rocket science…” I’d like to take this moment to officially challenge that statement.

Hang with me for a minute folks.

I think there’s something much more difficult we’re all grappling with here, something we’re failing miserably at, something even the best and brightest minds shy away from because they just can’t even get close to solving the damn problem.

You know what we don’t have a great grasp on? Dealing with each other.

Let that thought just sink in for a second.

We have literally launched humans into space, mapped damn near every inch of this planet we’re living on, built machines and handheld devices that are all linked and talking to each other on this invisible network called the internet and somehow we can’t figure out how to have a civil conversation with someone we disagree with without resorting to yelling and name calling and spouting ridiculous vitriol toward another human simply because their opinions, ideas, or experiences don’t match up with our own.

We’ve all gone fucking mad.

Indulge me for a moment while I quote Gilmore Girls. (I know, it seems like my train of thought is taking a hard left turn right off the tracks here, but I promise there’s a point. Hang with me.) In Season 1, Lorelei says:

“I’m afraid once the heart is involved, it all comes out in moron.”

In the context of the show, Lorelei is giving some witty motherly advice to her daughter Rory who has just had one of those awkward early teenager moments where she totally embarrassed herself in front of the guy she’s crushing on. But I’ve always loved this quote because I think it carries much more weight than that. I love this quote because I thunk it speaks to the way we humans are ruled by our emotions, whether we really want to admit that or not.

We’re hearing so much lately about this colossal divide in our country, how we’ve managed to politic ourselves into what, to an alien observer, might resemble a good old-fashioned elementary school playground brawl. You know, the kind that tend to erupt after several long days of misunderstandings and snide comments and furtively whispered gossip set tempers boiling. Then, all at once, the rage and frustration and posturing spills over and spreads like wildfire.

See, we humans have this very natural sense of self-preservation. We instinctually want to protect ourselves, our families, the things that are important to us. And some of the things that are important to us are our beliefs, our passions, our individual experiences and ideas. If you think about it–those things are our whole world, our very existence. All of those things are what make you “you“.

So when someone or something comes along that disrupts our experience or questions our ideas or challenges our beliefs, it’s the most natural thing in the world to hear the alarm bells sound.

That’s what happens when there’s a glitch in our Matrix. Our flight or flight kicks in and we feel this gut-wrenching need to preserve ourselves and our reality. It’s all of us. It’s all we know.

And sometimes that fear of losing ourselves takes over. And that’s when we start blaming and labeling and fearing and hating those who are different. That’s when we lose what’s most important–our humanity–because we no longer see our fellow humans as humans. We see only the “other.”

So no, this isn’t rocket science. It’s a whole lot fucking harder than that, because we’ve got to admit that all of us are part of the problem, and all of us are also part of the solution. It takes work to change our patterns of thinking, to recognize those automatic fear responses. It takes courage to turn that scrutinizing lens on ourselves. And it takes a helluva lot of strength to admit we have been wrong.

But guess what? We’ve all been wrong. And we will continue to make mistakes and misjudgments until the day we die–that’s part of life. And I think the real reason any of us is here at all is to learn as much as we can, grow as much as we can, and spread around as much love and light as we can before it’s our time to go.

Walk into every situation and interaction with these two goals, and I think you’ve got a good chance of living a damn good life:

  1. Learn something new every day.
  2. Leave every situation (and any person involved) better than you found them.

Last month, in honor of MLK Day, I had the honor of attending a brunch at work and listening to a speech by Ruby Bridges who, at just 6-years-old, was the first black child to integrate an elementary school in her hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana. It was an incredible speech, and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since. Compulsive note-taker that I am, I had more than four pages by the time Ruby finished, but my favorite was this:

“Evil doesn’t care what you look like, what you have, where you live. It just wants a chance to work through you. Evil just needs a place to be. The good news is–so does Good. The Good need to stand up and do something, say something. Let the Good work through you. Doesn’t matter what you look like; if you’re good, I want you on my team.”

There’s always going to be Good and Evil. It’s just the nature of things. But I truly believe there is far more Good than Evil in this world. The problem is, we’ve just allowed the Evil to take over and become the loudest voice in the room. And we’ve allowed ourselves to lose control and start shouting along. That’s what happens when we lose sight of our humanity, when we lose sight of each other. It happens when we fear and slander and name call and hate each other, focusing on the differences, forgetting that deep down at the very core, we’re actually all the same.

To look at an other and recognize them as human is to see our own humanity. To look at an other and celebrate their differences is to celebrate ourselves.

Maybe I’m a hopeless optimist, but I believe if we look long enough and try hard enough and reach out to each other with open minds and humble hearts, what we’ll find will be beautiful. Hell, I bet if we take a moment to stop, take a deep breath, and look around, we’ll see it already is.

Dear 2020

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Dear 2020,

We welcomed you quietly–one kid in bed, the other at a sleepover, watching a late night movie on the couch at home. It’s too quiet in this house without Electra. Losing her right before the crush of the holidays and the long vacation from work somehow hurts more. I found myself caught between moments of melancholy and just needing to keep busy so I could stop missing her so much, so I could stop walking into the living room or looking out in the yard and expecting to see her there.

I spent several days grief-cleaning. I vacuumed, dusted, and rearranged Henry’s room. I moved Cadence’s room to the old spare bedroom/office, and then decided to redecorate a new spare bedroom/office/writing space complete with fresh paint and new furniture (which is due to be delivered next week).

And I gathered all Electra’s leftover food, dog treats, blankets, dog bed, kennels, unused medications–anything that could be needed and used–to donate to the local Humane Society. I didn’t want all of Electra’s things to be gone, but I sort of needed them to be. It made the pain a little more manageable. And I’m thankful that Stevie has been so sweet and patient as I fumble through the grief.

The calendar page turns, and a new year always brings excitement. You double down on all the things you’ve been wanting to do, meaning to do, procrastinating. You start out hopeful, start fresh. I’ve never been one to go overboard with a fancy New Year’s Eve party or a detailed list of resolutions, yet it’s hard not to buy into the magic and promise of a fresh start. The excitement this year has been tempered by loss and the introspection it always brings. It has made me think a little harder about my priorities, about the balance lack of balance in my life lately.

I need to be better–a better wife, a better mother, a better friend. I need to be a better leader at work. I need to be a better human in general.

And I need–really need–to make time to write again.

I made the mistake of telling one of my colleagues (who is also a writer) about the 365 Project I completed a few (ahem, like 9) years ago, and he threw down the challenge that maybe it’s time to get serious about another one if it will help me shake off the dust (and we’re talking about a real one, not the bullshit I tried to limp along last year by just finding random photos and quotes and lying to myself that it somehow counted). I’m swimming in ideas and unfinished projects–it’s starting to drive me insane. And since I just spent half my holiday break setting up a brand new home office, he kinda has a point. It might be time to get serious and actually get some shit done.

I mean, if I really want to continue to call myself a “writer,” I need to be writing. Right? That’s sorta how it works.

But I gotta be realistic–there’s no way I can do a 365 Project blog again. Not now.

A blog a week? Now that I can probably do. But to be completely honest, the pressure of trying to write something I actually feel like putting out there in the universe for actual people (other than me) to read is a whole lot of pressure and anxiety I don’t need in my life. I always want what I put out there to be good (or at least a couple levels above shit) so if someone does read it, they don’t feel like they’ve completely wasted their time and burned off precious brain cells.

What I am committing to–seriously committing to–is writing every day. Just writing. A journal entry, a letter, a chapter, a scene. Hell, even a poem if the mood strikes. And who knows, maybe some of it will end up here, but a lot of it won’t. And I’m okay with that. What matters is I’m making space for it, and I’m holding that space sacred. That’s my gift to myself this year.

So here we go, 2020. I’m walking in with no expectations and no specific plans (because dammit that somehow seems to be what always works out the best for me). I’m just going to be here, doing the best I can and then getting up and trying to do even better the next day. And in this new decade, I promise I’m going to have more meaningful conversations. I’m going to connect with old friends and make a few new ones. I’m going to read more books, taste (and cook) new foods. I’m going to travel to a few new (and visit a few favorite) places. I going to live and learn and love, and I’m going to try like hell to fall into bed each night knowing that I’ve squeezed as much joy as I possibly can out of every day.

Sounds like a pretty tall order, but I’ve always sort of enjoyed a challenge. And lucky for me, I’ve got some pretty rad people along for the ride.

Making her last day her best day

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“Somewhere in between the pace of life and work and where you’re going, something makes you stop and notice, and you’re finally in the moment.” -Come From Away

Man, nothing brings your world to a screeching halt like the moment you’re faced with saying goodbye to a pet.

No other way to say it, friends, today was a shit day.

It has been a hard year for our hound, Electra. We haven’t been able to ignore the signs of her aging—the wounds that have taken longer to heal, the arthritis flaring, the usual laziness slowly giving way to lethargy. Visits to our vet and a few new medications bought some time and some relief. But this week her breathing became labored and she suddenly lost interest in food.

We always said the day Electra stopped eating like Joey Chestnut trying to win the annual 4th of July Hot Dog Eating Contest would be the day we knew her time had run out.

I took Electra in for some tests this morning, and the doctor called me to come look at the x-rays.

“I hate to tell you but I have to be honest,” she said pointing to the shadows on the film. “Your beautiful girl has a great big heart, but this time that’s not a good thing.”

And the blood tests confirmed it—our sweet Electra’s heart is failing.

We talked about options and time, and what I kept saying over and over through my tears was that I never wanted Electra to suffer. And I knew we were standing right on the edge.

I spent the rest of the day sitting beside her, feeding her all the treats and scrambled eggs she will eat (which I hate to say is not very many compared to the legendary feasts of days past).

Mostly, I spent the day just hoping like hell that we gave her a good life, because damn this dog deserves it.

For all the fun we always poked at her for being a food whore and a rabbit killer, Electra is the finest dog that ever lived (and don’t you dare try to tell me otherwise because I will fight you right now).

She never barked obsessively at nonsense like doorbells and delivery men.

She never protested our kids grabbing onto her droopy folds of skin as they pulled themselves up and found their balance and learned to walk (in fact, we often watched her position herself strategically next to them and brace herself when she saw them reaching).

She never growled or snapped or made a menacing move toward any living creature (except a few rabbits and Foerth’s dog, Indy, but we all know Indy probably deserved it).

Electra never demanded anything but love and head scratches and food.

My Aunt Jen said something on the phone today that hit me right in the heart (of course I had to reach out and ask her for some reassurance that we’re doing the right thing; she’s the best vet I know, and I trust she’ll give it to me straight and not bullshit me). She said she’s always lived by the rule that she never wanted her pets’ last day to be their worst day, and every decision she has ever made to either try and manage the effects of aging or humanely euthanize has been made with that rule in mind.

I don’t want Electra’s last day to be her worst day. Our sweet girl deserves so much more than that. She has given us her entire life—love and laughter and memories and a million beautiful moments we will never forget.

Tonight, our hearts are hurting, knowing that tomorrow might be the last time we hold Electra and watch her sitting, regal as a queen, in the grass at the top of the hill with her hound dog nose stretched up high to catch a passing scent. But there is some small comfort knowing that we can take the time to make sure tomorrow is Electra’s best day—filled with warmth and love and as many treats as her big hound dog heart desires as we say goodbye and send her home.

All I wanted was a hot cup of coffee

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Our hound dog is being harassed by a bunny.

Yeah, you heard that right.

We are officially one week and one day into this mess and it just keeps getting weirder. Sit back and let me paint you a picture of what’s been going down in the Romano house these last eight days.

After a busy few weeks at work, all I was really looking forward to over the long Labor Day weekend was a chance to sit down and drink a hot cup of coffee. See, as a mom, I’m always brewing coffee and pouring myself fresh cups, but I honestly can’t remember the last time I was able to sit down and drink a full cup while it’s still hot. There’s always some interruption that pulls me away–Stevie, the kids, the dog, the doorbell, the dog running out the door because the kids opened it after one of their neighbor friends rang the doorbell. So I finally decided I was going to brew my coffee, pour a cup, and then take it outside on the patio to enjoy a little early-September sunshine and maybe even do a little writing.

I took one glorious sip before Henry came over and tapped me on the arm.

“Mommy, Electra’s digging,” he said, pointing behind me.

I didn’t even bother to turn around. On hot days, Electra will occasionally dig herself a cool spot in the dirt near the garage and flop down to snooze in the shade.

“It’s okay buddy. Digging won’t hurt anything.”

I opened my notebook and held my pen to the empty page, taking a second sip while I gathered my thoughts.

“Mommy, Electra’s got something in her mouth,” Henry said. And then I heard a muffled squeaking noise before Electra let out an excited hound dog whine.

I set my coffee on the table, tossed my notebook and pen in the empty chair beside me, and jumped up from the chair all in one frantic motion. I hollered at Henry to stay back and braced myself for whatever I was about to find. Electra has surprised us a few times over the years–digging snakes out from under lilac bushes, chasing (and sometimes killing) birds and rabbits, trapping an opossum and her babies in a dark corner of the yard. Hell, there was one night I caught her stalking a screech owl that had perched itself on the post of our chainlink fence. Luckily I managed to grab her and drag her away before she pissed the owl off and suffered any damage.

And as soon as I saw her gingerly pulling something small and brown and squeaking from a hole she’d carefully excavated in the flowerbed, I knew exactly what we were dealing with.

Electra had gone and found herself a nest of baby bunnies.

Now, if you’re new to this blog, let me give you a little bit of history…

We adopted Electra when she was just shy of a year old. Her life pre-Romanos was spent with a dozen other beagles and beagle-basset mixes living in a kennel and being trained to track rabbits. No lazy couch naps. No gourmet dog cookies. Just training and tracking and learning how to put that hound dog nose to good use finding rabbits.

Electra obviously knows how to catch a rabbit scent, and knows to make a helluva lot of noise to let us know when she’s on the trail. But we’re guessing that’s about as far as she made it in her training before she was surrendered to the Arizona Beagle Rescue and adopted by us. There’s no mistaking it when Electra starts tracking a rabbit. She puts the whole neighborhood on alert with her booming hound dog voice. But the thing with Electra is she doesn’t quite seem to understand what to actually do with the rabbits once she finds them.

Hell, half the time she’s so focused on tracking that she doesn’t even realize the damn rabbits are sitting less than two feet from her face.

Then the rabbit takes off and Electra takes off, barking and howling and hauling ass around the yard in hot pursuit. And somehow, as lazy and uncoordinated as our sweet dog is, she has managed to catch (and unfortunately kill) more than a dozen full grown rabbits. Most of the murders unfortunate incidents honestly appear to be mistakes…like she somehow managed to catch up with the rabbits when they hit a fence or took a wrong turn.

Once, Electra even managed to trap a rabbit in the space between our chainlink fence and the neighbors wooden fence and all of her excitement and barking scared the damn thing to death. She spent the rest of the afternoon whining  and crying like she’d just lost a dear old friend.

But baby bunnies? Totally different story.

Electra has managed to find two rabbit nests in her life. And both times, all she wants to do is pull all of the babies gently out of the nest so she can lick them and love them and apparently make them her own.

Poor sweet hound. She just doesn’t seem to understand that’s not how it works.

So, I managed to grab Electra by the collar and wrestle her away from the nest. She’d only had a chance to pull one baby out and drop it gently in the grass. Behind me, Henry was squealing.

“Oh look at the baby! He’s so cute! Look at the baby rabbit Mommy!”

“Don’t touch the baby, H. Just stay back. We gotta get Electra away and help him.”

Henry followed close behind as I pushed Electra back in the house and grabbed a pair of gardening gloves from the garage.

“What are you doing Mommy?” he asked. “You helping the baby?”

“Yep, I’m helping the baby. We gotta get the baby back in his nest so his Mommy will come back.”

The baby was squirming and trying to burrow into the lawn. I nudged gently, looking for any sign of blood or broken bones. But other than a thin layer of dog slobber, the little guy seemed to be in good shape. He made little clucking noises and kicked his legs as I scooped him gently into my gloved hands. I peered into the hole in the flower bed and saw three other little bunnies huddled together, so I carefully laid Electra’s baby on top of the pile. He wiggled and snuggled back in with the others.

Then I gathered the scattered piles of dry grass and tried to rebuild the nest the best I could. Inside the house Electra was howling in protest.

“Okay H-man, we gotta stay away from the babies now that they’re back in the nest. And we gotta keep Electra away, okay?”

“Okay,” Henry agreed.

I grabbed Electra’s old tie-out chain from the shelf in the garage and wrapped it around one of the trees on the opposite side of the patio. Stretched taut, she would be at least five feet away from the bunnies. I figured that was as good as it was going to get, and as long as Mama Rabbit would come back, we might be able to watch these babies grow and bid them farewell with no casualties. I reached out to a local wildlife rescue to make sure we had a solid plan, and a very helpful lady named Vikki told me all would be well if we could keep Electra away for a week or two.

For the next few days, we kept Electra on her chain and left the nest undisturbed. We even saw Mama Rabbit come back a few times to check in on the babies. All was well, right up until Friday evening when someone let Electra out without putting her on her chain.

(I’ve got two guesses…ahem…Cadence and Henry)

And then, the nest was empty. No sign of Mama Rabbit or the babies (and thankfully no sign of any carnage either). So, we assumed that we’d seen the last of our little rabbit friends, and wished them well.

Now this is where shit started to get weird.

Saturday morning, approximately 7:30 am – Cadence bursts into our room yelling that Electra is barking really loud and there’s a bunny on the patio. Sure enough, one of the bunnies is hiding behind the stack of plastic patio chairs. With Electra safely wrangled in the house, we manage to shoo Baby Bunny into a small box, fill the box with some of the discarded nest, and place the box in the flowerbed near the original nest hoping Mama and Baby will figure this shit out. Baby hangs out in the box most of the day and then disappears mid-afternoon.

Saturday night, approximately 9:30 pm – Electra has her last meal of the day and we put her out on her chain, just in case. Lots of barking and whining, so obviously Mama or Babies (or both) are somewhere close by.

Sunday morning, approximately 11:00 am – Electra goes into full-blown tracking mode and everyone in Southeast Lincoln knows it. It’s been a long time since Electra has tracked this hard (she’s honestly gotten way lazy in her old age) and the kids think it’s hilarious, so I pull out my phone and start recording. As I try to get in front of Electra and get some good video, I suddenly look down and see Baby hiding in plain sight, burrowed in a patch of long grass near the tree trunk less than six inches from Electra’s nose. That’s me almost dropping my phone as I quickly grab Electra to pull her away. (And what I really should have been recording was the next 10-15 minutes of us shooing the Baby over to the side of the yard away from Electra’s chain. Every time Baby would jump, Henry would squeal and Cadence would holler and laugh. It was like a slapstick scene straight out of a Carol Burnett Show special).

Sunday afternoon, approximately 1:30 pm – I come down from putting Henry down for a nap and hear Electra going nuts in the back yard. Cadence let her out and forgot to put her on the chain. I go around the side of the house near the gate and Electra is trying her damndest to shove her face between the brick garage wall and the chainlink fence post. On closer inspection, I see Baby Bunny oh so casually lying in a patch of overgrown grass near the garage about a foot from Electra’s slobbery face. Electra spends the next four hours whining and pleading with Baby Bunny to please just come a little bit closer. You gotta give Electra credit for being persistent.

Sunday night, approximately 11:00 pm – Heading to bed late (always a bad idea when you’ve got work the next morning) and I put Electra out one more time. She’s off-chain because I couldn’t imagine the rabbits would actually return after being so thoroughly shepherded out of the yard. Suddenly, Electra’s hound dog voice is echoing in the darkness. I pull on my slippers and head outside. She’s on a fresh scent in the yard. It’s late, and I can’t indulge her anymore, so I grab her collar and haul her into the house. I turn around and Baby Bunny is sitting on the edge of patio, not three feet from the back door, just hanging out like he owns the place. He doesn’t even move when I grab my phone to snap a picture. I’m starting to think Electra might have a stalker, or this poor Baby is all sorts of confused and thinks Electra might be his mother.

Today (Monday) noon – Stevie comes home for lunch, let’s Electra out, and she’s tracking again. Baby is back and exploring the yard.

Today (Monday), approximately 7:00 pm – Electra is trying again to shove her face between the brick garage wall and the chainlink fence post to lick Baby Bunny who is hiding in the grass less than eight inches away.

Today (Monday), approximately 7:30 pm – Doorbell rings. It’s Cadence and the neighbor girls telling us that Electra got out of the yard when one of the other neighbor boys opened the gate. Baby Bunny is gone. Electra is tracking like crazy.

Tonight (Monday), approximately 10:00 pm – Stevie puts Electra out and notices Mama Rabbit is hanging out in the yard, so he hooks Electra to her chain. Mama Rabbit hops away without Electra even noticing. Now Electra is tracking in the yard and occasionally howling when she catches a whiff of a fresh scent.

At this point, Stevie and I are convinced that these rabbits are just screwing with our dog. I guess we’ll see what tomorrow brings.

To be continued?…