I am blessed

[Kathleen Helms]

I am

Every time I decide that humanity has just about struck rock bottom and deserves a good hard kick in the head, something good happens and I am reminded that overall, we're not doing too badly at our jobs. Yes, we're surrounded by strife -- war, hunger, homelessness, poverty, crime, hatred, sickness -- but look at the blessings!

Sometimes it takes weeks (months ... years ... a lifetime ...) to find it, but for everything bad that happens there really is a counter-balancing good. Every time the bad things start piling up and I feel like I'm about to be buried, God notices. He stops what he's doing and He turns His attention to me and He laughs. "You think I've forgotten you, do you?" He asks, and then, He lets me have it. And because He's God, He does it with style.

First comes a little nudge to remind me. You think the day sucks? Well, look at this glorious sunset I'm about to lay in front of you. Does THAT suck? Are you paying attention now? Okay, get ready for the show! And the Good Stuff™ starts. Just to be sure I've gotten the message, He periodically sends another little nudge. But wait, that's not all! He knows when I get in a serious funk I'll need reminders.

I want to share this silly little string of coincidences God once set up for me. It's all wrapped up in a series of events that covered the course of the year 2006, events that I don't intend to touch on, because if I do touch on them I'll ruin my own good mood! I'm not sure why I'm sharing this particular story now, I sat down intending to type up a message about friendship and this started coming out instead.

I woke up this morning (after less than five hours of sleep) in a grand and glorious mood. I've got plenty I could be upset about, a laundry list of "I wish" and "I want" and "I need" items I could air, and reading the news did nothing to alleviate it. Murder, murder, murder, murder ... this one killed a college student, that one killed his family, this one murdered her newborn ... that one killed a young girl, this one starved his two year old, that one did it at a church, this one in a mall, that one did it for God, that one did it for the voices ... it just goes on and on. I could write a 12,000 word dissertation on the evils of mankind and work up a really good rant.

But I'm in too good of a mood! I don't want to be brought down. I refuse to be brought down. It's my day to be happy and by God, I'm going to be happy or else someone's gonna pay ... ! Seriously, though ...

January 2006.

Our beloved basenji Jake had to be put down. Jake was 13. He had spent his first ten years with a family who seemed to love him, but who treated him less than kindly. One day they decided to move and couldn't have a dog at their new house. So they sent Jake to rescue and he wound up with Charley waiting to be re-homed. When he first came to live with us -- and our then five year old basenji boy Willy -- he was skittish. He had a lot of nervous habits. If you moved quickly, you'd startle him. He growled a lot, snapped and snarled. He was really bad the first month. We came very close to calling Charley back and telling him we just couldn't keep him, it just wasn't going to work. And yet there was something there, some spark of something that said "please be patient with me, I'm really trying. Honest!" Three years later, his death left a hole in our hearts that still hasn't entirely healed. He was the sweetest boy. He remained cantankerous, but it was mostly all just for show. He didn't really have a mean bone in his body.

In any case, I'm digressing. The point is, the poor old guy went into kidney failure brought on simply by too many years of not quite enough medical attention and complicated by old age. That was that.

The only other thing you need to know before I get on with it, is that at that point, for three years Missy had been saying she wanted a puppy (as opposed to another dog from rescue). This puppy was to be a female. It was ideally to be black furred. And it was to be a basenji-shiba inu mix. I had spend three years trying to explain the improbability of everything lining up just so and kept telling her "yeah, keep wishing kid."

So, back to the story. Jake has died. Missy and I are heartbroken and decide to go to SICSA (a no-kill shelter near us) intending to comfort ourselves by petting some puppies. When we signed in, we told the woman behind the desk that we had no interest in adopting, we were just there to love on some puppies. We still had a dog at home and we couldn't stand the thought of trying to "replace" Jake. She gave us the nod of approval with a knowing smile.

There are three rooms of dogs at SICSA. The front room has small dogs, puppies and small-medium sized dogs. The middle room has larger dogs, and older pups that are going to be large dogs. And the back room has the monsters, the ones that look like they're half horse.

We wandered around, petting dogs, commenting on the ones we liked, the ones that were noisy, the ones that looked sad, and so on. After going through all three rooms, we decided to go back to the front room and have another look. There were a couple that had caught our eye the first time through -- one was a chihuahua-jack russell terrier puppy and the other was a four-year old beagle mix named Barney. Barney was such a friendly (and loud!) dog -- his eyes were definitely pleading "pick me! Oh, please pick me!" We weren't going to pick him, but we were definitely going to pet him.

On our first go thru the room, we'd noticed that one little dog near him was all curled up in a little ball. She was (we thought) solid black and she seemed frightened. Her name caught our eye, because it was "Annette" which is my mom's name. Because she was so timid and all curled up with her back to us, we hadn't really paid her that much attention.

When we came back in the room, Missy was petting Barney and I was looking at the little gal in the upper cage. She turned over and yawned this massive yawn. She looked at me with navy blue eyes and with a puppy smile she stretched. I noticed that one of her paws was half white, with little black spots on it, like Willy's belly. I said "Missy, look! She's got basenji spots on her paw!" Missy looked, but continued petting Barney for the moment. She said "I'll pet her in a minute, Barney really needs some loving here."

Then I read the puppy's date of birth -- 11-17-2005. Missy's birthday is 11-16. I said "Missy! She's only two months old and she was born the day after your birthday!" Missy got up and began petting her, but Barney again comandeered her and she returned her attention to him. The kid has a heart the size of Texas for animals.

And then I looked at her breed. In the "breed 1" slot was "basenji" ... and in the "breed 2" spot was "shiba inu." No, I am not kidding. Missy burst into tears and said "I want her, mommy. God put her here for me! She's my prayer come true!"

Now, honestly, what do you figure the odds have to be? Not just a basenji/shiba inu mix (which is itself rare), but one that's a girl AND a puppy AND black furred, as well. And in SICSA on the very night we happen to be there. Naturally, we adopted her. Missy named her Vixen, we call her Vixie most of the time -- she'll answer to both.

Later on we learned that she is actually a basenji-hokkaido inu mix. Hokkaidos, we learned, are actually infinitely cooler than their smaller cousins, the shiba inu. Our little five pound ball of fluff has become a 45 pound mountain lion. She's sleek, lean and wise. Vixen is our navy-blue eyed angel puppy. She was put there in SICSA just when she needed to be there, to answer a heartbroken little girl's prayer and to remind her mommy that blessings are all around us, even when we can't see them for all the trouble.

Coincidence isn't anything more than a blessing all dressed up in neon to catch our attention.