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My Dog Is Dying: The Real Life Crappy Choice Diary, Entry 1

January 16, 2012 by Robyn Fritz

my dying dog The lure of immortality dances through our lives, weaving delicate patterns that tease us with the possibility.

To live forever.

And then, of course, we don’t.

Honestly, I never expected to live forever. You’re born, crap happens, fun happens, you die. Nope, I never expected to live forever, and I didn’t, either: last February I died of the flu, and, sure, I obviously came back, but I still died. At home in bed with my kids: my dogs, Murphy and Alki, and Grace the Cat.

I never thought Murphy would live forever. My dog. My eldest. She had so many things go wrong early in her life, we were surprised she made it to 3 and celebrated when she hit 5.

Today, January 16, 2012, she is 13-1/2. She’s been healthy and vigorous since she was 5. Mostly. There’s arthritis, things like that.

But to think of “Murphy” and “old age” astonishes me. I’m still more astonished that, somewhere along the way, deep down inside, I thought she would live forever. What an idiot I can be.

I just never expected it: either Murphy’s old age or, then, Murphy dying. I should know better, since I was only 9 when the first person I thought was immortal died, and I’ve lost many people and several animals since then. But somehow I just assumed that Murphy would skip that phase.

And now in the last few weeks I’ve learned that she is dying. Purely by accident, since I am the super careful slightly neurotic overly analytical intuitive, we discovered that she has a tumor on her spleen.

Murphy is dying.

Somewhere in the last few days I decided to record our last journey together, from the shock of discovery to the agony of choice to the stupid things you think of when someone you love is dying. A running journal. The story of almost immortal.

I know how it’s going to end. I don’t know when. I only know it happens a little bit with every breath I take, I can feel it.

The human-animal bond is a strange and wonderful thing. Living a multi-species family life is both inspiring and terrifying: every day you should be realizing that it’s one less day, not one more, but you don’t. You can’t.

Living an intuitive life where you know that all life is equal is also a strange and wonderful thing. You learn about choice, about individual choice, and family choice, and community choice. It’s beautiful. Terrifying. Absurd.

Real life is about choice. Crappy choices are part of it. How do you live, and die? What does it look like? Why should we share it? What can it mean for our lives in community, for our lives as humans with animals, and homes, and businesses, all wrapped up in the mystery of nature and of the planet itself?

What happens when someone you love is dying?

Once again, I’m going to find out. Write about it. Maybe see what you think.

Will it be cathartic? Maybe. Angry? You bet. Resigned? Never. Goofy and absurd? Most likely. True? Every single word.

Even in my most optimistic moments I can’t see anything positive coming from this, because at the end Murphy will be gone.

But something is coming.

We shall see.

How an Eagle Kachina Accidentally Helped Build a Community

September 29, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

My mom loved Southwest art. My dad loved my mom. I loved them. When the eagle kachina dropped into our lives, I was greedily snatching as much time with them as I could, building memories.

One day my dad called and said he’d found an art piece for mom. “Not like yours,” he said wryly.

“Oh, bummer,” I said.

We both giggled, remembering the day years before when I’d announced that I’d bought my first art piece. “Does it have horses?” he’d asked. Of course it did.

“So what is it, Indian stuff?” I asked now, referring to mom’s penchant for all things Southwest, right down to their interior décor.

“Of course,” he said. “But it’s big, so when you come down for Christmas will you take me to get it?”

“Absolutely.” I was touched, my parents never asked for much.

A Family’s Last Holiday

So at Christmas that year, I drove dad downtown to pick up his gift for mom. We got it safely home and unwrapped it together, while Dad told me the story of how they found it. Dad was crippled with rheumatoid arthritis, so it fell to me to giftwrap it, ironic, since he had taught me the art of giftwrapping when I worked for him in his business.

We didn’t quite know what to make of this art piece: about two feet wide and tall, it was a copper sculpture, partly painted turquoise, with a curious mixture of human and really big bird. We knew it was the artist’s representation of native American art and spirituality, but that was it: we were appreciative, but ignorant, barbarians.

Eagle Kachina, the tag said. Expensive and hard to wrap, I thought, and not my taste.

But it was clearly my mom’s. Christmas Eve she ripped off my lumpy wrapping and spent the next week dragging Mr. Eagle Guy, as we called it, around the house, trying to decide where to hang it.

I reveled in that Christmas. I got to help my dad give a gift to my mom. I got to listen to my mom babble about it. And I got to share a small family moment with my parents, a moment where we celebrated and had fun together, glorying in the family bond. In community.

As it turned out, it was also the last Christmas I shared with my parents. My dad died in June, and my mom 10 months later.

The Eagle Kachina Comes Home … Sort Of

When we closed up their home, my brother and I sorted out who got what. I insisted on taking Mr. Eagle Man, not because I really liked it, but because it was a concrete reminder of a wonderful last holiday with my parents, at a time when illness and disability dulled all three of us.

No question the piece came home to live with me.

Years went by. Years when I moved the piece around the house. It was beautiful, yes, but not my taste.

It also didn’t belong in my home.

Things like this happen. However they end up with us, the objects in our life don’t always fit. Sometimes we change, or they do, and it’s time for them to move on. The trick is to recognize that and to figure out what happens next.

Truth is, the eagle kachina never fit in my home. These days I work as a professional intuitive, which means I talk with things, from animals to businesses, homes, nature, and, yes, objects, including this piece. Back then I only knew that the piece was sentimental but just plain felt odd to me. It didn’t belong with me. Finally acknowledging that, I thanked it for its service to my family, and asked it to start looking for a new home, while also promising that I would not simply discard it. It was beautiful, full of family memories, and also represented an artist’s vision of a sacred object. It needed to call, and be called, home. Wherever home was.

It stayed with me for a long time, because no matter what I did, I couldn’t find out anything about the piece or the artist, or how to properly, well, rehome it. Not surprising, I guess, because it had been years, and the artist might have moved on, literally and artistically.

The Search for Home

Years went by.

One day, my new friend Tara came by. I was showing her my small condo, and she took one look at the eagle kachina and said, “When you’re ready to sell that, let me know.”

Hmm.

She told me that she collects Southwest art, and she thought my piece would fit well with a large metal sculpture that she’d purchased several years before. She’s a real estate agent and a Reiki master with an easy strong intuition, so when she said she wanted the piece, I just smiled.

She suggested that the store she’d bought her large piece from would know how to value it. So I emailed Hogan Trading Company with a picture and a question.

They promptly emailed back: not only could they put a value on it, they represented the artist, Dale J. Anderson. I spent a few minutes exploring his art at their website. Intriguing. After years wondering, all it took to find the artist was a new, visiting friend.

Strange small world. Awesome universe.

More time went by, because truth is, even when special pieces have to go, a part of you still clings to them. The kachina had to go. Talking with the piece, I knew that it belonged with Tara. The kachina and I both needed time to separate from each other: it was as if we’d both been waiting for its new home to show up before we could really say goodbye to each other. There had to be a new community before the old one could end.

Finally, I told Tara to come get it. Even though she’d only seen it once, briefly, months before, she promptly agreed.

I carefully wrapped it and Tara took it home.

Not long after, she called. The eagle kachina fit perfectly in her home: its beauty and its energy felt great. She was thrilled because it went so well with the treasured, large sculpture she’d invested so much in.

The odd extra touch: when she unwrapped it, she discovered the two pieces were by the same artist.

The eagle kachina really was home.

Treasures of Community

Truth is, I could have kept the piece in the family, or put it up for auction, or done any number of things with it. But the only thing I felt right about was honoring my parents’ love and family bond by finding another family that would fit this piece. It needed a community, and I couldn’t let it go without that.

Its home now is with Tara. For me, the circle is complete. I’ve been lucky enough to meet new people in a new community, and the eagle kachina has bridged both of them. It’s home now. And so am I.

What Made My Deaf Dog Hear Again, Part 2

August 31, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

When my youngest dog, Alki, became deaf, I had to figure out how I could make him comfortable with his handicap. How to make us all comfortable: Alki, my nearly 10-year-old Cavalier; his 12-year-old Cavalier sister, Murphy; Grace the Cat; me; and friends, family, and visiting clients.

We’re familiar with handicaps at our house: of the four of us, only Grace the Cat is not dealing with some kind of disability (although, in the middle of the night, I sometimes think her touchy tummy qualifies).

The trick is to balance empathy and compassion, fairness and firmness, for all family members. Sure, the newly handicapped family member takes center stage. However, everyone is affected, so paying attention to everyone’s needs short-circuits jealousies and misunderstandings and provides space for healthy change for everyone.

My multi-species family did the practical things, as described in Part 1 of this article. It’s what we added to the mix that mattered: the socio-cultural things that define how we survive, and thrive, in adversity.

Alki becoming deaf was a shock. Yes, like all living beings, he’d had some problems, but as we dealt with Alki’s deafness I was surprised how it pushed my buttons. Somehow I relied on Alki to be the ‘easy’ one, because he was so sunny and sturdy, Murphy had so many health problems, Grace the Cat had a rough start, and I’ve been handicapped for too many years to count.

I knew better, but I still never expected things to change for Alki. Once I got used to his Velcro personality it stuck to me so well that the physical and emotional teamwork that developed feels as natural as breathing. I didn’t want it to change. Or end.

I loved having his constant attendance. He loved always being there. Now we both mourned the loss of his hearing and had to work our way through it to both honor and deepen our human-animal bond. Sure, we did the practical things, but we also did the cultural ones.

Six Socio-cultural Comforts

Acceptance. I made it clear to Alki that his handicap didn’t change how I felt about him, only how we managed daily life. Then I proved it all day long.
Grace and humor. Meet everything, obstacle or otherwise, with grace and humor. I repeat: grace and humor.
Kindness and reassurance. Everybody has to adapt to a handicap. Alki and Murphy and Grace the Cat learned new ways of respecting and living with each other. So did I. Alki knows that I am physically handicapped and always in pain, and he worried about me having to get up and go to him. I simply made it clear that I would rather get up and walk to him than live without him.
Compassion. Everyone needs compassion, not just the handicapped animal. Take time to love and accept each other. Make sure everybody gets it.
Emotions. Put yourself in the animal’s place. How would you feel if you were suddenly handicapped? What would you need from your family? Act accordingly. Animals are emotional beings just as we are, so pay attention to their needs and concerns. So what could I do for Alki? This isn’t New Age pablum: a frightened, hurt animal can be dangerous, so you absolutely must know your animal’s personality. Is it shy, passive-aggressive, high strung, sensitive? Does the animal act as if it feels threatened or unsafe? Alki’s body language even at rest was clue enough: he was tense, on guard, curled in a scared tight ball. He was not himself. You see that a few times and you act. It’s dangerous and cruel to let unhappiness like that continue.
Love love love. Never stop telling every multi-species family member, including the handicapped ones, that you love them, and never stop proving it. Dealing with a handicap is time-consuming, frustrating, and upsetting, but if life were perfect, wouldn’t you be bored? You can choose a throwaway culture and abandon a handicapped animal, or you can help everyone adapt and grow.

We adapted to Alki’s handicap. I sighed away the sadness when it rose. Things happen in life, and this happened to all of us.

What really pained me was that Alki couldn’t fully adjust to his deafness. He adapted, but he was often uneasy, uncertain, and frightened. I knew I was missing something, but what?

The breakthrough was as ordinary as everyday life.

In our daily family rituals I have one-on-one morning and evening times with each animal. One night, I spent a long session with Alki. I hugged and petted him, and made sure he was looking at me as I told him how much I loved and respected him, that he would always be family, that we would deal with his deafness as best we could. That he was my son, we were family, and his deafness didn’t matter.

I assured him, over and over, that the only thing that changed was his ability to hear. Then I intuitively talked with him, showing him that we could still communicate even if he couldn’t hear me speak out loud. I gave him a long massage, something he loves. And I used a form of energy work, which I call dimensional healing, that arrived in our household about five years ago after I specifically asked for a form of energy that would work for my multi-species family.

That night I made my love and acceptance visible to Alki. He gradually relaxed. I felt better. Murphy and Grace the Cat fell asleep. I went for a drink of water and when I came back Alki was in an excited crouch on the bed. As our eyes met his sparkled and he thumped his tail hard, excited. The sad, perplexed dog was gone, and my beloved Alki was back. Breakthrough! Yes, a long time coming, but it did come!

Alki made huge progress after that—sure, he still needed extra care, but his sunny, optimistic, adventurous personality returned. He finally understood that, no matter what, he is my son and an equal family member, and that trumps everything.

Alki was deaf, yes, but he could hear what mattered—that he was loved and accepted. Then came the day when he proved that he could take that understanding back out into community.

We were out alone together, a block from home, when a stray dog ran up to us. Now Alki had been uncertain with dogs since his mauling and the deafness, so I fended the other dog off, while thinking it might be one of the dogs in our neighborhood.

I was surprised that Alki stood quietly beside me, instead of barking or shying away. The dog moved a few feet away and stopped to stare at us. We stared back. Alki and I exchanged a long look, then he visibly braced himself, just like humans do when we suck up uncertainty and move on. Calmly stepping toward the dog, Alki cocked his head at it, clearly inviting it to join us.

The three of us slowly made it down the street. Each time the dog started to wander off, I’d call it or Alki would turn and cock his head, and the dog would follow us. Eventually the dog and its people were reunited.

By the time we got in our own door that day I was bursting with proud mama-ness. I hugged and praised Alki for his kindness and bravery. He had not only faced his fear but put it aside to help another dog get home again. He had learned to live with a disability and go back out into community.

Alki has been fine ever since. Deaf, yes. Reassured by his family’s love, adjusting to changed circumstances, yes, my boy is home. It’s not the same home it was before he became deaf: somehow, it’s better.

Why? Because on the deepest level that counts Alki can hear again. Deafness is a condition, a handicap, yes, but it’s also a choice. Do we withdraw, do we hide, or do we adjust and find a new pattern to life? Like all things in life, we choose fear or we choose love.

We were afraid for awhile, but ultimately we chose love in our multi-species family. Alki chose love.

Love is what made my deaf dog hear again. Love and what comes with love: patience, grumpiness, acceptance, compassion, hard work, common sense, frustration, grief, and an adventurous open spirit that may stagger but never gives up.

The mindset that comes from love is what we use to nurture our families, multi-species or not, in the traumas and triumphs of daily life. It’s what we use to create communities where we learn and grow from our difficulties and celebrate our triumphs. With animals we call it the human-animal bond; in truth, it’s community.

Love helped Alki adapt. It didn’t make it easier, but it did make it bearable. He’s still my little boy who shouldn’t suffer, whose sunny disposition should be rewarded by endless health and youth. Bodies fade, but love doesn’t give up for anything.

Love did it.

Love made my deaf dog hear again.

What Made My Deaf Dog Hear Again, Part 1

August 29, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

My son is deaf. My youngest dog, my Velcro boy, my goofy sweet Alki, is stone cold deaf.

It happened when I wasn’t looking. Somehow, the years between puppyhood and senior dog warped and folded in on themselves, and my little boy aged.

It shocks me, really. Just yesterday he was an exuberant, mischievous puppy, glued to me and his dog and cat sisters, and suddenly he’s almost 10. Gray-eared. Occasionally creaky.

Deaf.

Looking back I saw the deafness happening. I just didn’t piece it together—the busy-ness of life is often overwhelmed by the details. Even when you’re vigilant, the subtleties can get lost in the mix. And when you have a multi-species family, there are the obvious things—in our case, meshing a human with two dogs and a cat. Human-animal bond, indeed.

Somewhere late last fall I noticed that Alki was reacting to street noises differently. Despite his training, he’d shy away from others on walks. Like humans are apt to do, I dismissed it as a ‘phase,’ and polished his manners while reassuring him that he was okay, especially important because he’d been mauled by another dog a year and a half ago.

Yes, life’s been complicated lately. Alki accidentally ripped off a toenail and nicked an artery, then his toe got infected and he had to wear a cone for a month, which gave him an ear infection apparently unrelated to the hearing loss. I was down with the flu and complications for two months. It was life. Age. Stuff.

Which is all to say, I had good reasons to stop looking for answers beyond the obvious. Good reasons. Just not good enough.

How Deafness Asserted Itself

One morning I went to make a cup of tea and my Velcro boy, always at my side, suddenly wasn’t. I called him. Nothing. I found him in my office, sound asleep. When I called him, he didn’t move. I gently touched him, and he leaped up, startled.

When the clues build up, you eventually notice. I started testing him. He’d fall asleep and not awaken when I left the room. When he was sound asleep, I’d have to shake him hard to wake him if I needed to. If I didn’t gently touch him when I left the room, so he knew what was going on, he’d sometimes awaken frightened, and come racing to find me. Sometimes he could hear me, sometimes not. Sometimes he’d look at me, confused, uncertain, hurt, cringing as if he’d done something wrong and would fix it if he could. Even in his usual safe spot in my office he couldn’t quite relax; he’d curl up in a defensive ball, drop off to sleep reluctantly, and startle awake easily.

Even though his sunny adventurous personality always won out, I felt bad for him, and for us. I also had to be careful about touching him if he was sleeping or not looking at me: startled dogs can be dangerous. We changed routines, for his safety and the family’s.

Still, I kept my eye on him. While physically healthy, Alki was also anxious and nervous, not surprising.

Since I am also a professional intuitive, I checked him on a gut level, too. His hearing was coming and going in waves, and at extremes, either quite loud or too soft. Easy to see why he was both confused and terrified. In talking with him, I learned he didn’t understand what was happening. He worried about what he’d done wrong, that someone might steal him, or he’d get lost, or we wouldn’t want him anymore.

I’d gently hold and pet him as I explained that deafness was something that happened, he’d done nothing wrong, I wouldn’t let anyone steal him or let him get lost, and we would never stop wanting him. Alki would always be part of the family.

Then he suddenly went completely deaf. No response. Nothing. I had to physically walk over to him and touch him if he wasn’t looking at me, because calling him no longer worked.

I had to be careful, yes, because it’s rude and dangerous to surprise someone, but I also had to give him space: I had to learn how to keep a deaf animal close without being overprotective and making him dependent. Emotionally, I had to find a way to restore his confidence and create a positive new family dynamic while dealing with my own sadness.

It’s a fine line we walk in families, made more difficult by disabilities.

I know. We are familiar with handicaps at our house. I’ve been handicapped for years, and my oldest dog, Murphy, has arthritis and is slowing with age. But familiarity with handicaps only helps anticipate difficulties—it does not make them easier.

Making all of us, especially Alki, comfortable with his handicap took work. Here’s how we did it.

Eight Practical Comforts

Training. I reinforced the hand signals we’d learned in obedience class as we drilled on public and private manners, and practiced with friends and strangers. All of us, animals and humans, learned how to be around a deaf animal, and it deepened our bond because we mingled work and fun. Ironically, the one thing about Alki that I could do without did not depart with his hearing. He was deaf but he still barked, and yelling at him didn’t work. (Honestly, it never did. In my less rational moments I wondered if he went deaf so he could bark and not hear me bark back.)
Attitude. No coddling. Yes, I made allowances for Alki’s growing deafness: common sense, sympathy, support, and compassion are critical. But we all have to learn our limits in life, handicapped or not, and how to compensate for them with grace and humor. Ultimately, we all have to take care of ourselves: self-reliance is key.
Calmness and patience. Running screaming into the night doesn’t solve problems, it just sprains ankles. Be calm. Be patient. Teach that to other family members. Starting with yourself.
Attention. Everybody needs extra attention. Those who aren’t handicapped will feel guilty about it and be jealous they aren’t getting as much attention. Still, the newly handicapped really do need special treatment. Spread the love. Take time with everyone. Focus on them when you do. Play hard.
Courtesy. Learn new ways of getting along. It takes time. Think: what would you need and want if you were suddenly handicapped? What does this animal need and want? How do you respectfully meet those needs? For us it included making more eye contact, waving, smiling, petting, hugging, and matter-of-fact living. In short, big open physical demonstrations of love and acceptance.
Education. Alki is a cute dog: he’s a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. People love to pet them and you don’t always see it coming. A woman petted Alki when I wasn’t looking and he whirled around in shocked surprise; we were all lucky he didn’t bite her. Make sure people approaching your handicapped dog know what the situation is, and stay vigilant.
Don’t say it. Saying stupid things like “It’s God’s will” or “It could be worse” are pointless and insulting. I caught myself telling Alki that “it could be worse, you could be blind.” The astonished look he gave me said it all. It didn’t make being deaf easier. It demeaned a real agonizing problem. I was an idiot. I’m only admitting it here so you don’t become an idiot, too.
Caretaking. Handicapped animals need specialized care. Make sure everyone who interacts with or cares for your animal, from family and friends to vets to groomers to sitters, understands its specific needs and is willing and able to meet them. Don’t leave a handicapped animal in the care of someone who doesn’t understand what the disability means or doesn’t think animals have feelings. You could come home to an injured, depressed animal.

Practical comforts help us get through our daily lives as easily as possible. They make it possible for us to choose to expand our lives even while kicking and screaming about the injustice of a handicap. Deep lasting cultural changes occur because of how we choose to live with change. In Part 2: taking it cultural.

The Camperdown Elm: What Are We Doing to Nature?

August 6, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

: Copyright (c) 2011 by Danny L. McMillin

I’m staring at a Camperdown Elm as I write this. I’m in my car, at Port Gamble, Washington. The dogs and I are going to see our vet (yes, we drive a minimum 5-1/2 hours to see the vet). Every time we do that, we stop at the park at Port Gamble to stretch and explore.

For 10 years I’ve been wondering about this tree. For 10 years it’s creeped me out, and today is no different. You look at this tree and you wonder what in heck we’re doing to nature.

Turns out, somewhere around 1640, the earl of Camperdown, or somebody who worked for him, noticed a sport growing on the floor of the earl’s elm forest (note the irony). Of course the logical thing would be to figure out what it was and see what it did next, but why be a logical gardener? They dug the poor thing up and grafted it onto a Scotch elm tree and the rest is creepy mutant history.

Seriously.

This tree is a parasite. It only grows as a graft on that particular kind of elm. A Scotch elm. When it takes hold they cut the Scotch elm away (as in murder). The new tree is called a Camperdown Elm.

Got that? A perfectly good tree dies to make room for something—a mutant—that only humans can make. Not nature. Humans. It can’t reproduce itself.

This particular Camperdown Elm was planted in that spot in Port Gamble in 1875. I have no idea how long it’s supposed to live.

The question is, should it? How far do we go in altering nature? What would this ‘sport’ have become if Mr. Earl of Camperdown had let it be? If everybody who grafted one of these things had chosen to let the original tree live instead? Would the ‘sport’ have changed on its own? Would it exist at all?

I talked to this tree today. Yes, I talk with things. I was trying to withhold judgment, to not dislike the tree because of my perceptions of the perceptions of Mr. Earl back around 1640, and of all those people since then who think the whole mindset that would create a Camperdown Elm makes sense.

The response? The tree is angry and quite mad. As in, crazy, ferocious, insatiable. “Eat, eat, eat,” it said, over and over again. I backed away, taking my kids with me. We won’t visit it again.

This isn’t the first time humans have changed a plant at our whim, and not nature’s. Thank goodness, or I might not be eating marionberries this week.

Humans do this all the time, alter things to suit ourselves. It’s why our gene pools, from food crops, to animals, to our fellow humans, are so small, which is stupid and multiple topics for other days.

But, for today, when does our fascination with what we can do make sense and when is it just plain hubris?

I look at the insane Camperdown Elm (which also says it is dying, by the way, for anyone who cares to check), and I shudder.

How do we explain this to each other? To our children? To nature? How do we choose to live in, and with, the world?

The Camperdown Elm. A mutant tree that only exists by human intervention that requires murder.

Ick.

When Animal Communication Bites

July 23, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

Have you always wanted to talk with an animal? And hear it talk back?

It’s easy. Just do it. But be polite, or you’ll find out, like I did, that animal communication can bite.

Just like talking with any being out there, from a tree to a hurricane, animal communication is about respecting all life as equals. That means listening to what each being has to say. And being respectful in our interactions.

Sometimes you talk with other beings, like animals, to learn simple things, like what an animal thinks about airplane travel. Or what kind of outing it would like (chasing squirrels, sunbathing, eating pizza have all come up when I’ve asked my dogs what they’d like to do). Quite often my work is talking with other beings about their life’s work, which can be stunning, as it turns out there are jobs out there that most humans can’t even imagine, jobs that other beings, like our dogs and cats, take for granted.

Sometimes when you talk with animals you get what you really haven’t been looking for, like a lesson in good manners. That bites. And it should.

The other day I was looking at my eldest Cavalier, Murphy. She had just turned 13 and was happily munching a birthday blueberry pie. I noticed she was a bit heavy, which isn’t normal for her. She had been eating a lot lately. So had I.

I said, “Wow, Murphy, you’ve gotten a little chunky.”

She promptly shot back, “Well, I’m not as fat as you!” She was loud, annoyed, amused, honest: her usual straightforward self. Oh, and right.

Ouch! Okay then! A lesson in manners from my dog!

The truth is, we seldom treat other people as respectfully as we should. Despite our best intentions, we often offer even less respect to our animal companions. Sometimes we’re just not thinking about what we’re saying or about whose feelings we’re hurting. Sometimes it just doesn’t occur to us to treat our animals as equals who expect politeness, just like we do. Sometimes we just forget good manners between species.

I should know better. Actually, I do.

I apologized to Murphy for being rude and unthinking.

A few days later, I was bathing Grace the Cat, not our favorite household task. I was noticing that Grace had gained weight, and I said, “Grace, you’ve gotten chunky.”

Already annoyed because she was wet and soapy, Grace snarled back: “Didn’t you just learn that lesson from Murphy?”

Ouch again. “Yes,” I said, chagrined. “My apologies.”

Whoever you talk with, but especially when you’re talking between species, mind your manners. If you’re talking, you should be listening. And thinking about what you’re saying before you say it.

Because animal communication can bite.

Have you said something rude to an animal lately? Did you apologize?

The Guardians of Alki

January 14, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

Yes, I talk with gardens and the beings who look out for them: where I live, I call them the Guardians of Alki, because Alki Beach is our neighborhood, and the names the guardians have historically been assigned are mean and scary and not worthy of us or them. Besides, at the time it didn’t occur to me to ask them their name, or that it might be inappropriate (it is) to just give them one. This is how I learned a good lesson on naming.

The first time I saw the Guardians, I was closing up the house for the night when I noticed all these strange-looking beings were milling around in the backyard, on the wild, isolated hillside that few people can actually see. Some looked like walking trees, others like plants, others like combinations of people and plants. None of them looked human, but they were also picnicking and settling down to peep in my window! I had never seen anything that looked remotely like these beings, and all I could do was stare. Then, like any normal, rational human, I turned away, muttering, “Criminy, I need drugs.”

Of course, I couldn’t resist one more peek. That’s when they noticed me. “Look, there she is!” a few yelled, so I was sure that, yes, they were peeping! And making a game out of it! Then they waved at me.

Dumbfounded, I stared, then thought, Oh, what the heck (it’s kind of my motto now). I waved back. Slowly. Bemused, to say the least.

That’s how I met the Guardians. Turned out they were gardeners, so for the next year I worked with them to rehabilitate the ruined gardens at our condo, from the soil up (and yes, there were real humans doing the work, not me, I’m physically handicapped). Finally, it was October, and I was rushing to get plants into the garden before winter. These beings had been nothing but helpful: to the wild and domestic land that surrounds us to the amazing being that is our neighborhood. But winter was coming quick, and the plants weren’t yet purchased or planted. The Guardians were anxious to go into the garden before winter, so I invited them to come into my home and live with us for a month until the plants were in—as long as they first got approval from my animals.

One of the guardians, the smallest, shyest, and most unusual looking (like a possum with a bright green round bush growing out of its back) took me up on the offer and moved in. My animals didn’t mind, and it often made me laugh, because it would hide and peek out at me as I walked by, and then duck under the furniture when I teased it: “I can see you.”

Some time after that I read something that made me realize that other people didn’t call these beings Guardians. They were formally known as fairies, and many people used to think, and maybe still do, that fairies are bad guys and will hurt us if they can (why, I have no idea).

I was astonished that somebody with that kind of reputation would do what the Guardians had done: benignly, patiently help me build a garden. Or fail to identify themselves, which seemed, somehow, wrong. After all that work together, I thought they should have told me who they were. Why, I have no idea. (Note again that at the time it never occurred to me to ask them their name; I was arrogant and unthinking in simply assigning them a name based on the work I thought they did.)

Honestly, I didn’t really know what a fairy was, and still don’t. (One of the things my guides like about me is that I’m somewhat clueless about the in’s and out’s of things like witchcraft, shamanism, or folklore, so I’m bold and daring (they said this, laughing), or at least open to new experiences that aren’t pre-defined. For example, I think about talking with something, like an oil spill, and then I’m there. The first few times I did this I had no idea people called it astral traveling. I think this is also why I have such a large community of beings who accompany me on my conversational jaunts, as I sometimes goof up and need backup, and they are all easily amused. The closest I’ve come to accidentally killing myself I was tackled by an annoyed guide, so I’m learning to be more cautious.)

So anyway, there they were, looking at me, and I was mad. “You’re fairies?” I yelled. “You’re fairies? Why didn’t you tell me you were fairies?”

They very solemnly looked at me and said, “If you knew they called us fairies, would you have invited us into your home?”

That stopped me in my tracks. Would I? Does a name make a difference, or is it the work, or intent? What a lesson!

“Yes,” I said. “Because I know and trust your work. What they call you doesn’t matter.”

Something changed in that moment. They looked at me, at each other, and smiled. And when the garden was finally planted, the Guardians of Alki moved into it and settled down for the winter, including the little visitor. By then it was November, and quite mild. I worried about that. Even I knew it takes awhile for a garden to get established, and a freeze could ruin everything.

It was the land and the weather itself that answered me, joking. “Did you think we’d put you to all this work and then freeze the garden?”

I laughed and relaxed. We had a mild, dry winter that year, unusual for Seattle. In fact, I had to drag out the hose and water most of the winter. But spring was worth it.

And, a year later, a coyote appeared regularly outside my office window. For two springs and summers I grinned happily as I watched this wild dog play on an isolated hillside, nap, scratch its fleas, try to catch a bird shadow, tease my cat, dash away when it accidentally spotted me, and lounge while I worked. Yes, I knew more about animals than plants, had spent three years turning a ruined landscape into a certified Backyard Wildlife Habitat, complete with some rare native plants, and yet what truly thrilled me was the coyote.

The Guardians knew that. When I exclaimed over the coyote, they said she was a gift, thanks from them for the work I’d done in the garden and on the hillside to re-establish a native habitat. They gently pointed out that their gift was the coyote, because they knew I liked animals better. I was happy but saddened, too. I really did love the garden, but the guardians were right: I loved the coyote more.

To this day I do not know what name the Guardians give themselves. I haven’t asked, and they like the name I instinctively called them. So the lesson in naming continues. And one in appreciation, too, because I really do love the garden, but that coyote…

Is It Weather Worker or Weather Talker? How to Work with Weather

January 14, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

I call myself a weather talker, not a weather worker. There is a difference.

A weather worker changes the weather, usually because the weather worker wants to. The weather and the land around it, including the guidance forces that created it, are not always consulted.

While many of us can change the weather (yes, change it), it’s rarely a good idea. In fact, it’s usually stupid. Why? Because humans just aren’t smart enough to know more about nature than nature itself does.

Before you object to that, consider our food supply. We can’t grow crops that are genetically diversified enough to keep us all from starving, so why would we be smart enough to know more about weather than the weather systems themselves, or their makers?

Here’s another thing. Everything is on a schedule; if you want to change that schedule it involves a lot of negotiation with many different beings. And there are always consequences, many unintended, all tricky, multi-layered, complex … never simple, and usually not understood until they’re upon us and impossible to avoid.

Being a weather talker is much more in balance with an earth paradigm, which sees all of life cooperating to build a healthy, balanced planet. If I’m interested in a weather change, I talk with the weather, and find out what’s going on. That’s how both sides learn: human and other.

I learn a lot about weather and the land by simply talking with it. These beings are often eager to talk with us, and when they’re not, they usually say why.

Sometimes, though, the prospect of talking with some of them is, well, daunting.

Okay, take a deep breath …

What would you say to a hurricane?

In Defense of Hurricanes

Is the planet’s weather changing? If so, why? Is there something we should do about it? If so, what?

Humans don’t understand hurricanes, and we absolutely have to. Now.

Hurricanes are massive cleansing forces. When a hurricane comes to an area, every being in its path, from human to building to plant to animal, everything gets to choose whether it will live or die. Everything. Whatever things look like afterwards, and I admit it can be terrifying and sad and disrupting, whatever it looks like is what needs to happen for the hurricanes to cleanse the land and the sea. Without them, the planet cannot survive. I know, easy to say, hard to live through, but it’s the truth.

Hurricanes are carefully planned and sent out into the world by what I call guidance forces (who laughed when I slipped one day and called them gods, because I have a lot of trouble with the god concept). Hurricanes are also fully conscious beings and actively choose whether to do the work they were created for, just like all of life. The problem is, like all of life, they can be manipulated, changed, so that they don’t do exactly what they were intended to do. They then go off course. This affects all the hurricanes that come after them, because if a job is left undone, everything behind it has to alter to try to do that work. This happens to all of life, but few things have the large-scale effect of a hurricane.

So, when humans construct machines to deflect hurricanes, or actively use their intuitive abilities to deflect them from land or to mitigate their strength, or to eliminate them entirely, we screw things up. Badly. We’ve been doing this for eons, and it has to stop. The hurricanes are really trying to save the planet, just like all of us. We need to understand and help them do their work by letting them do it. And we need to stand beside them with love and purpose and refuse to let other beings, including humans, change them. Hurricanes have the right and responsibility to choose to do their work whether we like it or not.

Humans are not the only beings that interfere with hurricanes, but we’re the only ones that most of us can really do anything about. If nothing else, we can change our attitude towards hurricanes. Every time we get mad and want one to go somewhere else, every time we fear one, we affect its course.

The one thing that all of us can do with hurricanes is literally thank them for their work and bless them on their way. You can do this whether you live in its path or not. All it takes is a simple thought sent its way, as you’re going to work, as you stop to get coffee, whatever. Remember, it is true, we all hold the fate of the world in our choice. We can choose to love a hurricane, which helps it do its work, or we can make everything worse by hindering it.

It’s really that simple. The ramifications are stunning.

In future posts I’ll tell the stories of the hurricanes I’ve met, and of the other weather systems I’ve worked with. I’ll write about how we can work with weather systems.

So what would you say to a hurricane?

What It Means to Talk with All Life

January 13, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

We can all talk with all life, from our food to our cars, animals to plants, businesses to homes, volcanoes to weather systems. Everything you can imagine—and many things you can’t—can speak with us. In fact, they are all already speaking to each other. In fact, the only ones who are not participating in an active, open dialogue with all life are humans. We are, so to speak, behind the curve, and have been for centuries.

Oh, Great, Another Spacey New Ager

I am not an airy fairy woo-wooey person. I am a cynic and a skeptic. I sometimes wonder why I am one of the people who can talk with other beings most of us had no idea could, or wanted, to talk with us. And were scary besides (like earthquakes and hurricanes). I think it’s because I also believe in the equality of all life, and am interested and respectful enough to have an open conversation with whatever wants to speak with me. I think it’s time for this ability to be taken seriously and shared with other humans, so we can regain an ability we’ve repressed for eons.

I believe that intuition and the ability to intuitively communicate is a practical, relevant ability that kept our ancestors alive. Like the abilities to see, hear, taste, touch, and smell, their intuition kept them alive when large prey animals were sneaking up on them: they ‘knew’ when they were about to become lunch. Humans that didn’t have that ability, well, got eaten, and their lack of intuitive ability got wiped out of the gene pool with them.

I am, essentially, a translator. I tell the stories of the beings who speak with me. I help other people speak with them, whether the beings are our businesses and homes, our cars, gardens or animals. I also speak with wild/domestic land and weather systems. That means I speak with beings like volcanoes and hurricanes. We can do this, and, in fact, we do when we are angry because a hurricane is coming, frightened of an earthquake, and awestruck by a steam explosion at Mount St. Helens.

The key is to speak as equals, to hear and to share what we hear.

That’s what I do.

Why Are People Just Now Speaking to All Life?

People like me are pioneers, like it or not. We have our work cut out for us: helping people understand that everything out there is alive and has an attitude to share with us, and that we can share with them, is daunting. We can do this work because of the wonderful, brave people who became animal communicators 30 years ago. They went public about speaking with the beings we are most intimate with: our animal companions. It was strange, then, to talk with an animal, but thanks to these people it is increasingly accepted. And many people are doing it.

Animal communicators paved the way for people like me to talk with other beings and not get locked up for it. They helped open a space that humans had forgotten about. Now that some of us are hearing and talking with these other beings, we’re stepping up to tell their stories and to help other people talk with them.

Is it strange? Yes, but if enough of us keep at it, it will become commonplace. Which it should be.

Yes, people do think I’m crazy. I keep going, because I’m not.

When people read my stories, work with me, or come to an event to meet me and my crystal partner, Fallon, they are just like me: skeptical, cynical, analytical, and curious. Sometimes they are reverential, because they’ve had their own amazing experiences with other beings, especially crystals. And they leave believing that it’s all possible and real because of the calm, respectful, interested, and matter-of-fact way we go about our work at Alchemy West.

Every time someone makes their own connection through us, every time we hear about their experiences, I know that risking going public with who I am and what I do is worth it.

So, now, what do you think?

Talking with Our Businesses: The First Principle

January 13, 2011 by Robyn Fritz

I was surprised when I first spoke intuitively with a business. It just hadn’t occurred to me, even though I knew that everything is alive. Literally. A tricky part is how that reverberates in our lives, or, perhaps, whether we will allow it to.

For people the concept that other beings have something to say to us, the right to say it, and often need to, challenges the basic mindset that we’re the apex of civilization. We have different brains than animals, true, and someone once said to me that a home or a business doesn’t have a brain, so we’re better. I think it’s more like the human brain is designed to help our bodies survive and thrive as humans. Other beings don’t need that particular device, or need it in the same way we do. It makes them different, not inferior. Biology is destiny? Weirdly, sort of.

People often get hung up on the simple fact that we invented our cars, our homes, our businesses, and much of what surrounds us (like peanut butter cookies with chocolate chips or computers). Sometimes I’ll look at my Cavaliers and my cat and realize we invented them, too (and, of course, they invented themselves, especially cats!). People are good at winging it, and then imposing rules on what they end up with.

Because we invent things we think we’ve created them, in something approaching ‘divine’ fashion. This presumes, and assumes, inequality. But, birds build nests, ants build anthills, so why is a car or house any different? They are things we’ve decided we need to survive. So they come and help us do that. It really is that simple.

In the current state of the world we depend on our businesses to acquire the money to buy the things we need to survive, from food to shelter. Whether we work for someone else, or go out on our own as I do, we need our businesses.

And our businesses need us.

How My Business Was Born

It took me a long time to decide to combine my writing, editing, and intuitive work into one business. I wasn’t quite sure how it would come together; all I knew is that I needed to be patient, which is not my strength. (I believe meditation should take about 10 seconds, and I tend to do my intuitive work while doing other things—multi-tasking to the extreme!)

Eventually I created two separate websites under one corporation that needed to represent the earth paradigm, the reality that all life actively cooperates to create a healthy future for our evolving planet. If we invited all life to participate with us equally, we would learn how to honor a hurricane and a weed, our homes and our food, our animals and our communities. Each of us holds the fate of the world in our choice—for humans, it’s our choice to be stuck-up humans or equal citizens on the planet.

Fine, but what was my corporation’s name? How could I describe transforming our culture and re-connecting people and the planet in terms that aren’t tied to the past? How could it be modern yet linked to the traditions it came from—our human past? I didn’t know, but I finally realized that my business would know, so I asked it what its name was. And back it came: Alchemy West. Of course. People are afraid of alchemy, because they think of dark occult weirdnesses, but alchemy is change, transformation, and this kind of alchemy is new, which my business thinks of as ‘west,’ and because we’re in Seattle, which is almost as far west as you can go before you fall off the continent.

My next step was to create websites when I have stubbornly refused to have a relationship with my computer (yes, I’m human and I goof up like everybody else). It took me months to settle on what I needed, sit down and do it, and find the right people to help me. In the process I became much clearer about what I needed out of business: community. I support other people and their businesses, but they don’t always support me. It’s a lesson I will continue to learn, because I’m optimistic and often too trusting for my own good.

What I didn’t realize was that my business had its own ideas about how it wanted to work, and that the many other beings I work with actually expected to be a part of the decision-making process. When I tried to do things strictly my way, for all the usual reasons, like giving business to friends to support their businesses as well, it didn’t always work. In fact, several times the failures were so huge that everything collapsed around me. Including what I thought were friendships.

Part of the reason was that the beings I worked with, especially the business itself, absolutely refused to cooperate with some people, and there was no getting past that. Plus, most of the beings who are part of my community and the Alchemy West Committee are not human: they are animals, volcanoes, beaches, my home, my desk, guides, crystals, salt lamps, the list goes on (and, yes, my computer)! Try to get all those beings to agree on a logo or the words on a page!

We had our goofs, but we finally did it. It took over a year for Alchemy West to gel and for me to get brave enough to combine all my work into one website, and then to launch our online magazine, Bridging the Paradigms.

How Do We Talk with Our Businesses?

I help people talk with their businesses. Conversations include business direction, mutual concerns, shared growth. The focus is on how they grow and learn together.

No, I do not tell people how to make millions of dollars or handle marketing or organizational development. Yes, I have formal business training, including an MBA, but this is about building a new relationship, one that assumes you and your business are equal partners, even though you may very well have different agendas. It’s a new mindset.

And that’s how you start, with thinking about your business as an equal partner. What first comes to mind when you consider that?