In keeping with my last two blogs, let me offer readers an alternative, if they do not wish to hear my ramblings about Frodo, my long-haired lurcher, who recently had a his right back leg amputated. The aptly named www.theblogofkevin.wordpress.com is a very worthwhile alternative read.

For the record, Frodo is doing well, and so am I. His canine brother, Pippin has also adjusted, and if you were to see them jostle and play fight, you might for a moment not notice anything had actually happened.

Sunday (30 December 2012) saw me do three dog walks. One with all three of us, one with Frodo trotting around Bartley reservoir and the other with Pippin on the Clent Hills. It was good to blow the cobwebs away. As Pippin ran, as mad as a hatter, after one leaf or another, I was slightly sad, noting to myself that Frodo will not be able to that again. That is in all possibility true, although there are number of things the vet decreed that he would not be able to do that he already has done. But it does not make him less of a dog than his brother, or less capable of enjoying life. That is a judgement that I make, not him.

I do need to be careful lest I ask him to do too much. He will do so. But he runs around the garden, greets people at the door, delivers letters to the post box, and was playing (with ease) with a Jack Russell by the reservoir on New Year’s Day. He still has the same eyes that can convince me to do anything. He does not know (I don’t think) that the cancer will return in all probability. For now he is the same, except he is not.

It seems to me that it is I who limit him. This is not in terms of walking and allowing him to play; but rather my mind seems to have developing a disturbing inflexibility as to what should be considered ‘normal’. Indeed, the first few times we walked together in the day-light, I was conscious of lots of people looking at us, and imputed lots of negative thoughts, which were in reality mine and probably mine alone. Most people do not even see that he has three rather than four legs. Most do not pass judgement on what sort of owner I am, although perhaps some do. It is the normal scheme of things that this is the case.

As, I think about Frodo, I am also aware about how many other things in life I have considered normal or decreed not to be. I wonder how to begin to address those things.  Then, in a moment or two inspiration, I am aware that my long-haired lurcher has learnt to live one moment at a time, and perhaps that will be a good place to start.