What I Learned from … 2009

Middle Zone Musings’ groupwrite project for this month is What I Learned from … 2009. Robert Hruzek has challenged us to compile a list of our favorite, best, most popular, whatever we choose posts for each month of 2009.

Choices like this are always hard for me for a couple of reasons:

• How do you choose your favorite child? Since every post comes from my heart, choosing my favorite post is about the same as choosing my favorite child.
• I write for my own enjoyment and don’t strive for profundity or eloquence—not that I would achieve those if I did strive for them. So it’s a little presumptuous for me to say any of posts are “best.”

In spite of the difficulties, however, I’ve come up with a list of posts by month.

• January: A Thirty-Six Year Tragedy—I chose this post lamenting the tragedy of 36 years of Roe v. Wade because I am passionate about saving the lives of unborn babies, and the thought of the 50 million babies denied the right to life sickens me.
• February: What I Learned from Love—I have been so blessed with the love of my family, the love of my husband, and above all the love of God that I was delighted to share my great loves.
• March: Healing Miracles—It took a series of three posts beginning with this one to describe the many healing miracles I’ve experienced in my life. What a blessing to experience these miracles and what a blessing to share them to the glory of God.
• April: Adversity? What Adversity?—This post was another opportunity to share the blessings I have experienced in life. April posts included five of six parts of a series on memoir writing, which I hope was helpful to readers. However, sharing God’s blessings is more important to me.
• May: Lessons from Community—The thing that surprised me most about blogging was the creation of community, and this post tells what that means to me.
• June: Creating Fictional Characters—This post was the first in an eight-part series based on a course I taught. The series was popular among readers and generated a lot of comments, and a couple of the posts rank high in Google for the phrase “creating fictional characters.”
• July: What I Learned from a Blooper—I enjoyed recalling a silly blooper I made that gave me the chance to share a little about physical therapy for strokes.
• August: Mission Impossible: Book Trailer for Dream or Destiny—Joanna Young’s challenge to post something we’ve never done before motivated me to try creating a video, which I’d wanted to do for a long time. Although I was satisfied with what I did for a beginning, I have yet to go back and improve the video enough to post it anywhere else.
• September: What I Learned from Laughter—This post links to a previous entry, which I enjoyed because I don’t often write humor.
• October: Domestic Violence and You—The last in a seven-part series, this post shared ways all of us can help with the problem of domestic violence, a cause close to my heart.
• November: Advent—We get so busy during the Christmas season that it’s easy to let other activities take priority over the reason for the season. Advent helps us prepare for the coming of the Lord.
• December: Christmas Gift-Giving—Though it’s important to focus on Jesus as the reason for the season, giving gifts at Christmas is a long and cherished tradition. The best gifts are those that come from the heart.

I’ve had some wonderful authors visit my blog this past year. Each of them deserves recognition; I couldn’t choose any one of them because I couldn’t choose all of them. Some posts weren’t considered because they didn’t contain anything original from me. The freelance rates survey took a huge amount of time and energy to compile. Recognition of special days—such as World Alzheimer’s Day, I Love to Write Day, and Religious Freedom Day—and special organizations and programs—such as Operaton EBook Drop: Free Books for Deployed Soldiers and Free E-Books for Read an E-Book Week—generated many comments. However, I limited my choices to posts that reflected my opinions, beliefs, and experiences.

Only two posts during the year generated 100 or more comments: World Alzheimer’s Day (102 comments) and Comments, Spam, and Comment Spam (100 comments).

The most-visited post this year continued to be a post from 2007: How Much Will It Cost? Average Freelance Editing Rates. The most-visited post written this year was Creating Fictional Characters—Part 1: Characters Are Story People. There were several other posts from 2007 and 2008 more popular than any 2009 posts.

Rather than believing that the quality of my posts is deteriorating, I choose to believe that good posts have staying power. That’s what I learned from 2009.

What I Learned from The Plant World

I grew up on a farm so you would expect me to know something about plants. However, south Texas was experiencing the worst drought in history for much of my childhood. Though the drought we’re in right now is more severe than the 1950s drought, the earlier one is considered the worst because it lasted so long—more than seven years.

My father turned to chicken farming after it became impossible to grow crops or provide feed and water to the cattle. He even gave up growing his beloved vegetable garden because he couldn’t water enough to keep the plants alive.

So as a young adult, I had no experience with plants. When I worked as an employment counselor for the hard-core employed in the 1960s  War on Poverty, I wanted to brighten up my dreary office. I bought a small ivy plant at a church bazaar. I dug up some dirt from the backyard and planted the ivy in a small cheese crock. In spite of  my lack of knowledge, the little vine thrived.

Mr. Martin, the supervisor of another department and a plant lover, brought me a mother-in-law’s tongue (a.k.a. snake plant) as a companion to my little ivy. Still knowing nothing about plants, I followed the same formula as I had for the ivy: dirt from the backyard in another little cheese crock with no drainage. Like my church-bazaar vine, the mother-in-law’s tongue thrived.

Then Mr. Martin, a heavy smoker, told us he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. The day he went into the hospital for surgery, the snake plant started looking limp and pale.  

Whoa! This had to be a coincidence, but I wasn’t going to take any chances. I decided I should learn something about plants. I bought a book and discovered I should have used potting mix instead of backyard dirt. I should have used a container with a drain hole or at least put a layer of rocks on the bottom of the crock for drainage. I bought potting mix and new containers. I haunted garden centers and asked questions until the clerks were ready to throw me out. If someone recommended plant vitamins, my plants got vitamins. If an expert said I need to fertilize, I fertilized.

All the attention seemed to make a difference. The little plant perked up and started looking like its normal happy self about the time Mr. Martin was released from the hospital.

All went well until Mr. Martin took a turn for the worse. So did the snake plant. I read more books; I asked more questions; I followed more advice. Mr. Martin improved, and so did the plant—temporarily. For the next few months, Mr. Martin had a series of ups and downs, and so did the plant he had given me. When Mr. Martin lost his battle with cancer, the little plant looked worse than it ever had. When I returned to the office after his funeral, my little snake plant was just a pile of mush on my desk.

Although I couldn’t save that little plant, in the process of trying to, I had accumulated dozens more plants (that soon grew to hundreds), acquired enough knowledge that people were asking me for advice, and developed a love for plants. A couple of years later, I quit my job, disillusioned with the War on Poverty.

I opened a small retail plant shop that expanded to a larger store that become an interior landscape company that grew to be one of the three largest interior landscape companies in the area before I sold it to a large national corporation twenty years later. All from trying to keep one tiny plant alive on my desk.

After spending two decades managing a team of more than a dozen people maintaining thousands of plants in hundreds of businesses, I could write a book on the lessons I’ve learned from the plant world.

But the most important lesson—the one I learned when I tried to keep a plant alive as a sort of talisman of a person staying alive—was written long ago far more eloquently than I could express:

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. ~ Ecclesiastes 3:1-2

photo credit: madaise

This post is an entry in Middle  Zone Musing’s What I Learned from the Plant World groupwrite project.

Added 8/17/09: Thanks to Matt Keegan for using this post as inspiration for You  Want to Pull in Readers? Tell a Story.

What I Learned from a Blooper

The theme for this month’s group writing project at Middle Zone Musings is What I Learned From Bloopers, Mistakes, and Embarrassing Moments.

While I’d like to say I’ve never experienced any of those, you’d know I was lying. The hard part was deciding which one to write about.

When I was in physical therapy following a stroke, the therapists used what I understood to be a gate belt. It was a long canvas belt they strapped around my waist. At first, before I could sit or stand, the therapists used the device to transfer me in and out of the wheelchair. When I reached the point I could walk, they held on to the belt while I walked to keep me from falling. They could pull me back if I leaned forward or to the side because of my poor balance.

I was in the rehab center for a month as an inpatient and went back several times a week as an outpatient for many months after that. For most of that time, the therapists strapped on the belt when I started therapy, and it didn’t come off until the end of the session.

Gate belt seemed like a strange name for the device, and I wondered why it was called that. A locked gate to keep me in place, maybe?

Then I wrote a romance novel in which the heroine experienced a stroke and went through much of what I did. When my mother read the manuscript, she said, “I found a typo in the book.” She pointed to the page. “You spelled this word wrong.”

“What do you mean? Of course, I didn’t spell it wrong. G-a-t-e, gate.”

“No, Lillie,” she said. “It’s gait, g-a-i-t. You know—like walk.”

Oh …

From that experience, I learned that my vocabulary isn’t as good as I thought I was.    If I wonder about something—like why a medical safety device to help a patient walk is called a gate belt—ask.

And I learned that even if I called the device the wrong name, it still did its job. I never fell in therapy, and I learned to walk again.

The video below shows a young lady in therapy walking with a gait belt.

Lessons from Community

A few years ago, when you talked about your community, you meant one of the first two definitions at Dictionary.com:

1. a social group of any size whose members reside in a specific locality, share government, and often have a common cultural and historical heritage.
2. a locality inhabited by such a group.

Today, you’re just as likely to mean any group of which you are a part that shares common interests. Often, the communities we belong to are virtual: blogs, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Flickr, Plaxo … and an infinite number of other groups, tightly or loosely structured, formal or informal. 

This month, Robert Hruzek at Middle Zone Musings has challenged us to write about What I Learned From… Community for his monthly group writing project. Compared to most bloggers, I’m a social media dud. I’m on Facebook and LinkedIn (and many more that I thoughtlessly joined when someone sent me an invitation). However, when I see “what are you doing now?”, I draw a blank. I’m not doing anything that would interest anyone else. I’m a poor friend to all the people I’ve invited or accepted as friends on the various social media networks. It’s not that I don’t want to connect with people—it’s just that sending a virtual plant or talking about what I’m doing or taking a quiz to see how much we’re alike doesn’t make me feel connected.

And the idea of Twitter is overwhelming to me. I see snippets posted on blogs, and they either don’t make sense to me or they seem to be a waste of time. I know many, many people love Twitter, make real friends, and find it productive. However, it appears to me to be like talking to people at parties—something I’m really bad at doing.

Guess I’m beginning to sound antisocial and the last person to understand community, much less learn anything from it. But I have a wonderful little community right here on my blog, and I’m part of the communities of other bloggers. Although I post a fair amount about writing, publishing, books, and authors, I have deliberately made this a personal blog so I’m not limited in what I write about. I post about my Christian faith, patriotism and troop support, and random musings.

That creates several sub-communities among my readers. Some like to read my Christian posts; some want to read about writing, publishing, books, and authors; some enjoy both; and some just find an occasional post of interest.

I’ve learned that small communities form when people share interests, even if only some of the interests are shared.

I confess I don’t pay as much attention to blog stats as I should. Recently, though, I looked at where my visitors come from and was surprised to see how many come from India, which is second only to the US. I have no idea why so many people from India visit my blog. If you’re one of those readers from India, maybe you can share in comments what attracts you here.

I’ve learned that geographic location or native language aren’t very important in determining who makes up a virtual community.

A significant number (125 to 200 each month) of my readers leave comments. Often, the comments are more interesting and informative than the post itself. Readers share their own knowledge and experience, which adds perspective that is missing from my post. They ask questions, which allows me to expand and explain my thoughts. They challenge me with different opinions, which requires me to evaluate and defend my own opinions and beliefs.

I’ve learned that conversation makes community interesting, entertaining, and educational.

DoFollow motivates many bloggers to leave comments, but as long as the comments are relevant, I appreciate them. Unfortunately, it’s becoming more difficult to separate legitimate comments from spam. Unless the person has left comments before, I delete comments that just say “great post” or “keep up the good work.” In some cases, those may be sincere, but so many of these are spam that I think they all are.

The spam that irritates me the most are those comments that quote part of my post or an earlier comment. If they quote my post or my comment, I catch it easily. But when they quote someone else’s comment on an old post, it’s not so easy to catch. So when I get comments on old posts, I go back and read all the previous comments before approving a new one. Although I could cut off comments after a certain time period, I don’t want to do that because I get valuable comments from people who go back and read the old posts when they discover my blog.

I’ve learned that some people try to gain the benefits of community without adding value, but that just makes me appreciate the community members that contribute even more.

Above all, I’ve learned that even a shy wallflower can be part of community and love it.

Adversity? What Adversity?

The theme for this month’s group writing project at Middle Zone Musings is What I Learned from Adversity.  If you’ve read my blog for any length of time, you might think I have plenty to write about.

I’ve been through a number of experiences that could be called adversity … things like:

• Rejection, both personal and professional
• Robbery and molestation at gunpoint
• An attack by a Doberman requiring more than 50 stitches in my head
• A burst appendix I didn’t know about for a week
• A stroke at the hands of a chiropractor that put in a wheelchair for five years
• Uncontrolled myoclonic seizures for six years, keeping me from participating in life fully

Yet in this Holy Week, I am contemplating what my Lord and Savior did for me, and I realize that, compared to Jesus, I’ve never suffered adversity.

As Isaiah (Chapter 53, KJV) prophesied:

 ¹Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed?

 ²For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.

 ³He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

 ⁴Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

 ⁵But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

 ⁶All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

 ⁷He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.

 ⁸He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken.

 ⁹And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth.

 ¹⁰Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.

 ¹¹He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.

 ¹²Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.

Nothing I have ever experienced or ever will experience can compare to our Lord and Savior being beaten, mocked, tortured, and murdered in the most vicious way.

And why? For my sins and your sins and the sins of the whole world. If I were the only person who needed redemption, Jesus would have died for me alone. My sin makes me Judas betraying Him, the chief priests and scribes condemning Him, Pilate washing his hands of Him, the crowd calling “Crucify Him!,” and the Roman soldiers killing Him. 

Yet Jesus prayed on the cross, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34, KJV)

What have I learned from adversity? I’ve learned that …

• Jesus “was oppressed, and he was afflicted” (Isaiah 53:7, KJV), and any adversity I will ever endure is mild compared to what He suffered.
• Whenever I go through adversity, Jesus is with me “for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.” (Hebrews 13:5, KJV)
• “The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” (Romans 8:18, KJV)

What I Learned from Love

photo credit: karen horton

The theme of the February What I Learned From … group writing project at Middle Zone Musings is love.

My first experience with love was the love shown to me and my siblings by our parents. They never had much money, but they always showed their love in countless ways. My father was a gentle man who seldom raised his voice or lost his temper. Yet I remember one occasion when he yelled at my mother in anger because she bought him a couple of pairs of blue jeans for Christmas. It didn’t matter that he didn’t own a decent pair of jeans, which were what he wore all the time except for church. Daddy was upset because Mama spent money on him when he wanted every penny they could spend on Christmas to go for gifts for the kids. My parents were strict disciplinarians and expected good grades and good behavior from all six of their children. But the kids always came first in their hearts and in their actions.

Then I fell in love with Jack. We’ve been married more than 41 years, and he’s always treated me like a queen. He has cared for me through a stroke, a dog attack, seizures, a fall, and several other situations. He does the laundry and the grocery shopping—and often brings home flowers along with the groceries. We’ve shared good times and bad, but we’ve always shared lots of  love and lots of laughter.

As much as I appreciate the love of my family and the love of my husband, I know it wouldn’t exist unless there was first the love of God.

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. … God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. ~ 1 John 4;10, 16

In February, we celebrate Valentine’s Day, Cupid, and romantic love. May we always remember and be thankful for the origin of love.

The Secret Is Finally Out: BLOGAPALOOZA

You’ve probably seen those mysterious hints around the blogosphere of something big coming to Middle Zone Musings soon. And you’ve probably been wondering what in tarnation Robert is up to now!

The secret is out. You can read the complete announcement at BLOGAPALOOZA – What I Learned From 2008.

To participate, write a post with a bulleted list linking to your favorite post from each month you blogged in 2008 (12 posts if you blogged all year). Send it to Robert, and he’ll post it as a guest post on his blog.  That means you’ll have twelve incoming links—which is great for SEO—plus you’ll introduce your blog and your favorite posts to lots of folks who haven’t discovered you yet.

The kick-off is today, and the Blogapalooza runs from January 5th through January 25th. Robert’s goal is 100 entries, and the sooner you get yours in, the sooner he’ll post it. You don’t want to miss out on this one! Head over Middle Zone Musings for all the details.

What I Learned from Government

When I read the theme for this month’s group writing project at Middle Zone Musings, it was déjà vu all over again. I was sure Robert had run out of topics and was starting to repeat himself. The topic is What I Learned from Government, and I knew I had written on that subject before.

But when I checked my archives, I discovered that the topic had been What I Learned from the World of Work. My post, What I Learned from Working for the Government, listed seven things I learned. I hope you read the original post as I’m not going to repeat those seven lessons. Instead I’m going to expand on one lesson that is very timely.

Even programs that are supposed to be for the benefit of people in need don’t always serve the needs of those they are designed to serve.

Too many people in our society expect the government to protect them from everything—enemies, misfortune, and their own bad decisions. They want their rights, and they want them now. They want financial security, and they want it now. They want to forget that there are evil people in the world, and they want to negotiate with our enemies.

The United States was founded as a republic, with limited federal powers. National security is government’s responsibility. Ensuring home ownership for citizens who can’t afford the houses they’re buying is not the role of government. It is a formula for disaster—as we’ve seen recently. Certainly many institutions and individuals—including greedy financial institutions who tried to make a fast buck, greedy individuals who tried to buy homes beyond their means, and greedy investors who tried to get rich quick—share the blame for the credit crisis. However, the root cause is the unwise, if well-intentioned, legislation and regulations designed to increase the opportunity for home ownership to more and diverse individuals.

Greedy financial institutions wouldn’t have made these risky loans if they didn’t have Freddie Mae and Fannie Mac to fall back on. Greedy individuals who didn’t have sufficient income for the houses they wanted couldn’t have gotten into debt over their head if they didn’t have the government supporting their entitlement to home ownership. Greedy investors couldn’t have profited from the situation if the government didn’t make it easy.

My heart goes out to individuals caught in the situation. But did those visionary programs to make home mortgages more accessible really help anyone? I don’t think so. Financial institutions would have been better off if they had made loans to people who were likely to be able to meet their obligations. Individuals who bought homes beyond their means would have avoided losing their homes or getting into serious financial trouble if they had purchased homes within their means or continued to rent. Investors might not be facing huge losses if they had invested more wisely.

So the well-intentioned government intervention has ended up making the situation much worse. The crisis has spread beyond the original organizations and individuals to impact our entire economy. Then comes more government intervention to try to resolve the problem. And when that doesn’t work, more government intervention …

The Declaration of Independence says we are entitled to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It doesn’t guarantee us happiness. It doesn’t guarantee us financial security. It doesn’t guarantee us health. It guarantees us freedom, and people who are free to succeed are also free to fail.

I quit my government job because I reached the conclusion that the government programs designed to help poor people were actually harming rather than helping. The War on Poverty was declared nearly 50 years ago, and we lost. People in those programs haven’t achieved success; in most cases, they’re still in government programs, still receiving handouts. Yet, people work their way out of poverty every day. They may get some temporary help, but they don’t expect government to make them successful. They work for their own success.

Yes, government taught me that good intentions don’t guarantee good results. In the coming months, we’ll see many new proposals and many new programs designed to help people. Will they help? Or will they hurt?

What I Learned from Stress

Some stress is good. Right now, I’m stressed as I plan my book launch party and schedule my blog book tour … and wonder if anyone will buy my book. That stress pushes me to be more productive so the launch of Dream or Destiny is a success.

Some stress is not good. In fact, it can be downright bad for both our emotional and physical health. Worry about the current economic crisis. Trying to meet unreasonable demands from clients. Computer crashes. Natural disasters. The death of a loved one. The breakup of a relationship. And on and on and on.

We can’t eliminate stress from our lives, and we can’t ensure that all stress will be good. We can, however, choose how to respond to stress. We can let it destroy our health and well-being or we can respond with resilience.

When I find myself getting frazzled over things that are beyond my control, I know that it’s time to recharge my spiritual batteries. I need to turn to God—to read His Word and talk to Him in prayer. Even in the most stressful situations, He will give me His peace that passes understanding.

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:6, NIV)

O MOST loving Father, who willest us to give thanks for all things, to dread nothing but the loss of thee, and to cast all our care on thee, who carest for us; Preserve us from faithless fears and worldly anxieties, give us thy peace that passes understanding, and grant that no clouds of this mortal life may hide from us the light of that love which is immortal, and which thou hast manifested unto us in thy Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

This post is an entry in the What I Learned from Stress group writing project at Middle Zone Musings.

What I Learned from Animals

My husband’s Dobermans used to curl up at his feet and put their heads in his lap. The dogs and I weren’t best buddies, but we got along until the morning I was running late for work.

This was back in the days when I showed up at my interior landscape company by the time the doors opened, before I learned to trust my managers.

This particular morning I was already behind schedule when I remembered I had to stop for gas. As I was backing out of the driveway, my husband, who had worked all night on a law enforcement job, pulled in beside me. I asked him to call the office to tell them I would be late. Instead, he said, “You call them, and I’ll get gas for you.”

After he pulled away, I realized the house was locked and my key was in my purse … on the front seat of the car. I went into the backyard to get the spare key out of its hiding place. Dobie, the male dog, who been chained to keep him away from the female in heat, had broken the chain and was engaged in … er … amorous activities … with the female. Without thinking, I walked up to him and gave him a light kick to get his attention.

Fortunately, it took him a few seconds to … disconnect, giving me time to turn around. He came after me, knocked me down, and started biting me on the top of my head. I tried to fight him off, but my resistance led only to bites on my arms.

After what seemed like forever, I thought I would surely die. I prayed, Lord, it looks like I’m about to meet You. I don’t want to be fighting when I enter Heaven. Forgive my sins and take me into Your Kingdom. Then I went limp, at peace and ready to die.

As soon as I went limp, Dobie let me go. He stood and watched while I got up and walked around to the front of the house. When Jack returned, he saw me standing in the carport, covered in blood. He wanted to take me to the hospital emergency room, but I preferred my family physician, who has a minor emergency clinic. We got there before opening, but one of the staff saw us through the door and took me to the emergency room to lie down.

Dr B arrived in a few minutes and gave me pain medication, but he delayed stitching the wounds until he talked to a plastic surgeon. He said my skull was exposed in an area about the size of a quarter, and he thought I need skin grafts. The plastic surgeon told him, “Stitch her up as best you can. We’ll do the grafts later because dog bites almost always lead to infection. Let’s get the infection cleared up before we graft.”

The pain was so intense that I couldn’t sit up. Dr B and his nurses used pillows to raise my head enough for him to reach the wounds. He took more than 50 stitches in my head and several in my arms. As he sewed, he said, “You’re lucky he got your head. If he’d got your carotid artery, you’d be dead now.”

Dr B prescribed antibiotics and told me to see him every day to clean the wounds and check for infection. Although I spent several days in bed with excruciating pain, the wounds healed with no infection and no grafts.

Twenty years later, the only physical evidence of the attack are two scars on my right arm – one in the shape of a five-pointed star and the other in the shape of a crescent moon. But, as usual, the lessons remain.

• Plan ahead – if I’d filled my car with gas on the way home the day before, I wouldn’t have been in the back yard that morning.
• Never come between true love … or true lust … in the animal world.
• An aggressive animal may seem tame, even loving, but it hasn’t lost its aggressive instincts.
• Head wounds bleed A LOT.
• Dog bites cause excruciating pain, the worst I’ve ever experienced.
• It’s difficult to feel comfortable around dogs after being attacked.

But, most importantly, I learned sometimes the best thing to do is to let go. I believe that if I had kept fighting, Dobie would have continued to attack until I was dead. Our natural instinct is to fight back – and many times, we need to fight back. But if you seem to be fighting a losing battle, maybe it’s time to go limp, let your enemy think you’re dead … and live to tell the story.

This post is my entry in What I Learned from Animals at Middle Zone Musings and High Callings Blogs.

Photo: “© Emmanuelle Bonzami | Dreamstime.com”

[tags]What I Learned From Animals, dog bites[/tags]

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