Blaze and Leo. And cancer...

Leo (above) and Blaze (below) This is one of very few entries in this blog in which I'll use the first person "I." I have to talk about this, and it's the only way I can do it. I've just learned one of my dogs has cancer. But this is not, "Aw, hell, another dumb-ass guy whining about cancer story. Where's my Internet porn? What'd the stock market do today?" So stick with me for a minute. Besides, the story's not over. It may have a happy ending. Half-a-dozen years ago my ex-wife left me for another man. She married him and they started a family. After my ex-wife sneaked out of the house -- she emptied the bank account and took the car and... whatever -- after that, I went into what they call "clinical depression." I made about five bad decisions during this period that caused me to drink more vodka than half of Russia, stop eating, refinance my home at double the mortgage rate, lose my freelance job, declare bankruptcy, lose my house, get hospitalized for two days for anemia, and live as a homeless guy in a motel for a year. Oh, yeah. My dad died four months before they took my house, too. So, it was bad. Really bad.  In my mind, there really wasn't much reason to keep going. So, what kept me going? Blaze and Leo. Blaze (female) and Leo (male) are angels in the form of border collie dogs. They are probably responsible for saving my life. How did they do that? Well, I followed them. People said, "You're going to have to get rid of the dogs, you know." Sorry, but no. No way. I made my life decisions based on not giving up my dogs. I stopped all drinking. I moved into a motel that accepted dogs. My first couple of weeks in the motel, I was so weak from my anemia that I hardly had the energy to get out of bed. I ate only four of my first seven days there. Still, I walked the dogs three times a day. I gained my physical strength back. Soon, I ran my dogs around the motel parking lot once a day. As a continued to gain strength I reached out to people for help. Many people helped me and my border collies. After a year in the motel I moved in with a friend in another suburb. But he couldn't house Blaze and Leo. What to do? I was able to arrange for them to live temporarily in three foster homes, with families who loved dogs. I'm not going to use real names here, but the third home was "Barbara's." Barb did much more than take in Blaze and Leo. She helped me find a job in the same suburb, and moved me into an apartment that allows dogs. (She's an angel in human form, but the Barb and me story is another wonderful one I'll talk about another time.) I am in my suburban apartment typing this. I have a job. Blaze and Leo are lying comfortably on the floor as I write. But four days ago, Barb and I took Blaze to the vet to have a fatty tumor removed from her left front leg. No big deal. In and out with a bandage and stitches. But they found cancer in that god damned tumor! The vet was not able to get all the cancer out during the surgery. I've just learned this today. Blaze and Leo are two dogs, younger than 10 years old, but after ...  1.) Helping me recover from illness and, ultimately, homelessness, and 2.) Being perfect animal companions who have brought love everywhere they have been to many people... Give me the frigging cancer! Blaze does not deserve this. She embodies nothing but goodness. But she has been chosen to suffer. Or maybe not... Blaze is a candidate for maybe another operation, or maybe radiation treatment, or maybe amputation. Yes, amputation. All I can do is continue to love them and care for them. I will update you when I learn more. P.S. How can an agnostic like me talk about angels so freely? Because my agnosticism is not like the word as it is defined in the dictionary. I allow myself to constantly search for what I believe to be "The Truth." My self-directed form of agnosticism has allowed me to see and experience miraculous things in nature and in life, as well as things that are horrible -- almost beyond what is tolerable. I choose the term "angel" for Blaze, Leo and Barb because it is the word that best describes them.