Lucy...........Part II

We picked Lucy up from a rescue shelter in Denver, and all we knew of her lineage was “Border collie mix.” As are most puppies, Lucy was so cute and cuddly that I actually felt good about throwing the easy part of my dog-less life away and signing up for a 14 year hitch in the Canine Corps. Not only was this black & white little fur ball adorable, but she had personality out the pooch wazoo; you could instantly tell that she was sassy beyond repair. She expressed herself to us and a constant stream of admiring hotel guests through the deliberate and continual use of her razor sharp little bicuspids: “Oh, look at this little darling, she is soooo cute, OUCH. Oh, that’s ok, she’s just a little puppy and she’ll outgrow OUCH!”

While everyone around me was smitten with Lucy to the point of having to wear drool catchers, I kept my focus and concentrated on the job of getting this little hellion potty-trained, as the notion of tiling a 12,000 square foot hotel was absolutely out of the question. Within a short matter of time, she got it; I supposed we trained each other. After a few weeks of intensive training, Lucy would essentially walk up to me, look me in the eye, and ‘bark’ with a purpose, saying “I’ve got to go outside and do business. NOW!”

Poor old Lucky never got that “I’ve got to go to the bathroom, now!” concept down; Lucy had it nailed in a matter of weeks. Lucky was sweet, but dumb; Lucy is smart, and efficient, but sweet doesn't enter into the picture. As the formative weeks went by, our Border collie-mix didn’t get tall like a Border collie; rather, Lucy grew long. Her front paws splayed outward as she sat and challenged us at our every demand. Her Border collie ears didn’t droop like a Border collie, but spiked straight skyward like, well, like a Corgi. Long body, splayed paws, spiked ears – without doubt, we had ourselves a ‘Borgi’. Lucy is a combination of smart, quick, independent, outspoken, multi-leveled herding dogs, with bloodlines that date back centuries; part of her wants to organize and round people up into groups, and the other part wants to punish and nip the heels of those who won’t comply.

Lucy, not aware of her mixed heritage, carries herself as a royal beauty; unique and unusual looking to the point of people asking “what a beautiful dog, but what is she?” Her head is way too big for her body, her plumed tail a natural and fitting accoutrement to her regal demeanor. Within a very short period of time, this sassy little bitch had full and total control our hearts; people would ask, “Are you the owner of the hotel?”, and my clever answer was always “yes, me and the bank”. But I couldn’t look them in the eye and give them that answer any longer; Lucy now owns this place - just ask her!

All Border collies need a job. As they were bred and used in the old country, their job was to herd sheep and cattle. Lucy’s job is to guard The Riverside. No one comes in or out, nor do they drive by, without her scrutiny and approval. She sits in the front window of the hotel and acknowledges all passersby’s with a low growl, a quiet ‘woof’ or an emphatic ‘bark!’ If Lucy doesn’t acknowledge you when you pass The Riverside, you don’t exist. If you happen to be a dog, she lets absolutely nothing back as she talks the worst sort of inappropriate foul-mouthed smack at you as you walk by that window; and God help your worthless canine ass if you would attempt to enter her hotel.

As The Riverside is a pet friendly hotel, the rules of guests bringing in pets had to be modified a bit with the addition of Lucy. No dogs in the common areas – bring them in quickly and get them in your room, and damn sure don’t have them off of a leash or out of your control. The attached link will send you to Tripadvisor, (http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g33479-d1153219-r45506009-The_Riverside_Hotel-Hot_Sulphur_Springs_Colorado.html) a site where guests can share their experiences of your hostelry; some of the shared information is actually factual, but not so much with this particular story. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, suffice to say that the authors of this Tripadvisor review fall into the category of “2%-ers.” Enough said.

Lucy has developed another peculiar habit regarding the intrusion of canine guests into her sanctuary. After she calms down and acquiesces to the presence of these intruders into her territory, she quietly lays in wait until the offending visitors have departed The Riverside. She will then surreptitiously slink up the stairs, never to be seen by us, locate the room where the gate crasher stayed, and poop outside the door. When I said earlier that she was potty trained, I meant it; this act has nothing to do with having an ‘accident.’
This is an intentional, malicious, wanton act of revenge, an “I spit on your grave!” sort of thing. She’s done this four or five times, but never has her “Eat S**T and Die!” pronouncement been as profound as it was on December 28th, 2009.

To be continued..........

Lucy

When all is said and done and we look back on our adventure in Colorado, no matter how many difficulties we’ve suffered or victories we’ve celebrated, there has been one shining light that blinds the memory of all of the good or bad: we found Lucy.

Those of you who know me well, know that my love and devotion to this dog is more than just a bit out of character for me. I’ll be honest and admit that I’ve never been one that you would classify as a ‘dog person’. Lucky, our family pooch of the previous 15 years, was thrust upon me after the fact of her acquisition. Julie and the kids were in Nevada, MO visiting her parents, while I remained in Kansas City for a rare, weekend business meeting. The year was 1991; Rachel was 6 years old, Scott 4 years old and Julie and I young enough to add to our family. After the aforementioned business meeting, I called Julie to check in and she opened the phone conversation with an excited:

“Guess What!!?”

“You’re pregnant??” I guessed, holding not only my breath, but my wallet, my heart, and had I a third hand, you can guess what else I would have held and tried to disable.

“No, we found a dog!” she replied.

“I’d rather you were pregnant.” I said. And I meant it, at the time.

Lucky, a misfit mutt found in the Nevada city park, was the best dog a family could have; sweet, docile, loving, good with children, etc. She never did get the potty trained thing down; her favorite bathroom area was our living room, in which I eventually ended up taking up the carpet and putting down tile. My Dad said “what are you gonna do, tile the whole house? She’ll find another place to go!” In fact we did end up tileing and hardwood-flooring the whole downstairs, but ever resourceful, Lucky found carpet upstairs to pee upon.

After spending her last few years as the neighborhood snack whore – she was all but a furry keg with legs – Lucky gave up the ghost on Thanksgiving Day, 2006. She had a stroke the day before Thanksgiving, and was in obvious pain and disarray as Turkey Day unfolded. Scott and I took her to be put down, brave Scott at her side during her last minutes on earth. I couldn’t do it; after filling out the paperwork and paying for things, I went back to the car and bawled. It was a quiet, teary-eyed, father-and-son ride home, back to family and the impending feast.

It might have been the morning after Lucky died, or perhaps the afternoon, when Julie began the slow, steady, deliberate, resolute chant of “we need to get a dog, we need to get a dog, and we need to get a dog.” “Good grief!” I said, “let’s give it some time.” For unlike true ‘dog people’, I had the good sense to examine the realities and know the consequences of getting a dog; there’s way more to it than the wonderful feeling you get when you acquire your cute, fuzzy little bundle of puppy love. Hell, I’ve seen the worst of it, where you eventually have to rip up pee-stained carpet that you paid good money for and bust your ass tileing the living room.

My anti-pooch ass-holiness won out for the better part of two years – no pooch, no problems; then fast-forward to January, 2009, living life Riverside. Before I knew and had a chance to react, Julie pulled a fast one and arranged to have a rescue pooch adopted for us by her sister in Denver. I was busy doing…I don’t know what I was busy doing, when Julie told me, “we’ve got a pooch. We’re picking it up in a few days.” “Oh crap”, I thought, “my days have changed, my nights have changed and my life has changed.”

The morning that we were to leave to pick up the dog, I was visited by our friend, Rick, who manages the hot springs. Rick is a transplanted pig farmer from Iowa, who made his nut and decided he wanted to live in the mountains. He’s an absolute breath of fresh air in these Colorado Rockies, the kind of person who you’d refer to as ‘real people’; a guy’s guy, a straight shooter and happy as if he had good sense. When I told Rick, in a rueful voice, that we were going to Denver to pick up a dog, Rick noticed my obvious distressful/regretful tone and mood and asked “What are you bitching about?? What kind of an asshole doesn’t like a dog??”

My glib, clever, not a dog person-ass didn’t have a quick answer for that one. In fact, Rick shamed me to the core; with his ‘from the hip’ challenge, in the form of a question, he made me question what I was really all about. And I didn't like the answer.



Enter Lucy……………..to be continued.

Living Life Lakeside.......Part II

I was in dire need of a haircut. Damned dire need!

For the past 20 years in Kansas City, I would go every two-three weeks to my barber, Rocky, plop myself into his chair and chat away while he did whatever he did to my hair. I never had to tell him what clipper number to use, or ask that he use scissors, not the razor, or tell him “I don’t think I want a bouffant today, not a mullet either; how about my normal same length on the top as it is on the sides cut.” I never had to say any of that; I sat in the chair, discussed sports, or my job, or whatever, and 15 minutes later, my hair was cut – the way I like it.

(Here’s a tip. If you live in a world where you have a barber who cuts your hair the way you like it, talks sports and roots for the same teams as you, shares your political views, and has a cool barber name like Rocky, don’t get off that horse. Keep riding it.)

When we moved to Colorado, I took for granted the small changes and adjustments that leaving our home of 50+ years behind would bring. The big changes were obvious; they were planned for and the required adjustments were assumed. It was the little things that came with relocation – finding a new church, couldn’t buy the same local bread, beer or BBQ sauce, new doctors, no dry cleaners, no Winsteads….new barber. And it wasn’t the big changes that stressed us; it was the little things that gnawed and ate at our “did we do the right thing by moving?” bone.

Never in Colorado did I get a good haircut. I came close, once, in downtown Denver; close, but no Rocky. It possibly explains why so many Colorado inhabitants – men and women alike – opt for the Allen Ginsburg look.

Off to Mississippi.

I work in an office building with lots of guys, and most of them have hair. So I know that a few questions to the right people will get me hooked up with a Southern version of Rocky – down here, his name will be Clem. He’ll talk sports (although it’ll be limited to SEC football), he’ll probably be on the same political plane as me, and as an added Mississippi bonus, he’ll discuss Faulkner with me. Nah, probably not gonna talk Faulkner with the barber, but at least he’ll cut my hair the way I like it.

After a few queries, I took the advice of a fellow worker who suggested a place in Brandon, “down Highway 80, right next to the Blockbuster.” After a morning meeting at our lab, which is right off of Highway 80, I decided to forgo lunch and head for that clip shop. Driving east on Highway 80 – first time driving here and all new to me – I passed a variety of stuff, but never came to Brandon, and never saw a Blockbuster. In fact, I was in the city of Pearl, MS. I passed a few hair salons, and as Highway 80 got into a residential area, and showed no promise of a complex that would house a Blockbuster, I turned around and headed back towards a shop that I’d seen a few blocks prior.

I pulled up and parked in front of ‘Amy’s Clip & Curl’. There were several women outside smoking cigarettes, and I asked “can I get a haircut here?” They all immediately threw down and stamped out their butts, and hustled me into the shop.

I’m certain you can all identify with the feeling you have of walking into a place, and as soon as you open the door, that little voice in your head, (the responsible little voice that cares about you; not the dominant, drunken, stupid loud voice that tells you to chuck it all and buy a hotel in the mountains), says, no, screams “turn around right now and get the hell out of here as fast as you can!!” That little voice was working overtime, actually, it was beginning to get hoarse, but I ignored it, and in I walked; mostly out of fear, as if I had at that point turned and run, two or three of them would have pursued and captured me – a haircut would have been well down the list of what they would have had in store for me.

The shop consisted of eight chairs, four on each side; each chair was manned, (although they were females, I’m still going to use the term ‘manned’) by women that all looked like Flo. Some of them had a full set of teeth; the one that cut my hair was found wanting in the bicuspid department – she’d only get about every third row of kernels if she were to eat corn on the cob.

She started out by asking, “So, how ya want’cha hair cut, hon?”

I wanted to answer “Properly”, but thought better of it.

“Do ya normally have it cut with electric clippers?”

“No, the man that normally cuts it, (sniff), only uses scissors.”

“Have ya ever had a razor cut?”

“Do you not have any scissors?”

“I just thought ya might wanna try sumpen different.”

‘A good haircut would be something different’, I thought, but said “Thanks, but I’ll just stick with the scissor cut.”

She ended up using scissors, the electric clippers and the straight razor, giving me a layered look that resembled a style of haircut that Paul Klee might have given had he been a barber. I thanked her, paid her, tipped her and asked for her card so I could make an appointment the next time I lose my mind and decide to get my haircut there.

Back at the office, I told one of my cohorts that I’ll probably go to Madison (the tony, northern Jackson suburb) next time I need a haircut.

“Where did you get your haircut?” he asked.

“Pearl” I responded.

“Pearl” he all but announced, “why that’s known as a fine Mississippi community on the move!”

“Really?? Why?” I asked.

“'Lotta mobile homes, that's why.”

To be continued.......................

Are There Ghosts at The Riverside?......Conclusion

OK - I admit it.

I’ve fallen prey to the same flights of fancy that I’ve impugned others for ascribing to; i.e. letting your imagination, as it is molded and then overwhelmed by this grand old building, kidnap and stifle your common sense. It could be that I’m simply, and somewhat irresponsibly, letting myself get caught up in the moment; kind of like letting yourself get hornswaggled into going to a KC & The Sunshine Band concert, having a few too many beers and then mid-concert saying to yourself, “hey, this ain’t half bad.” You know better!!!

My nephew used to live at The Riverside when we first purchased the place, and he was full of stories like this one: “I left my glasses out in the lobby, and went to get them at 3:00 in the morning, and in the room above the lobby, I heard someone stomp their foot, and there was nobody staying up there.” So you’re telling me a ghost seized the opportunity of you being in the lobby at 3:00 AM in the morning to stomp his foot, just once, on the floor? I would think a ghost would be a little more, well, creative in its attempts to terrorize the living; maybe rattle some chains, slam some doors, or at the very least, let off with a long, sustained moan of some sort. But a single foot stomp? Pu-leeeeze!

This collision of what we know, what scientific proof exists and what we want to believe is played-out weekly in one of those ghost shows on whatever cable channel it’s on; for an hour they build the suspense, showing nothing of substance, until the end where they've filmed a little flash of light, or a quick blur, the host saying “there!....look closely…there it is...Oh my God, did you see that?....let’s look at it again…there it is…see that blur!....did you see that little flash?”

Did you hear that foot stomp?

We’ve had several guests that have said “this room has a feel”, or “I’m not comfortable in the west wing, because of the spirits; I need to stay in the east wing”, or “I’m not comfortable in the east wing, because of the spirits; I need to stay in the west wing.” So you’re telling me the whole damn place is haunted? Truth be known, some of these people were probably scarier than any ghost you’d ever encounter; lovely people - please come back and visit us - but scary.

To those of you who might read this and say, “No way am I staying at this place!”, please know that in the 100+ year history of the hotel, no guest or resident has been maimed, hacked-up, garroted, disemboweled or beheaded by a ghost. No one has ever actually even reported seeing a ghost. This revelation might be a bit of a letdown for those of you who’d like to visit The Riverside for the purpose of having an encounter with the paranormal; unfortunately, I can’t guarantee you anything ghostly beyond a re-telling of my potentially ‘caught up in the moment’ experiences. And to those of you who shudder at the thought of spending the night in a haunted hotel, let me profess this: there is no bigger chicken in the world than me - if I can live here, and even stay here by myself, then you have absolutely nothing to fear. Except for maybe Lucy, if you're a Bichon Frise. Really!

I saw an old man standing in the hall. Right!
I saw a shadowy figure walk along the patio perimeter. I’ll swear to it!
A bathmat floated down the hall and ended up folded on a bathroom chair. What else could have happened?!
A phantom reached into the shower stall, when my eyes were closed, and turned the water off. Would you have a better explanation?

Are there ghosts at The Riverside? I honestly don’t know.
Are there ghosts anywhere? You tell me.
One side of me desperately wants there to be ghosts; it tells us that there’s more to our lives than this single radar blip of time that we’re here on this earth. In the event that I can come back, I’m going to save some money so I can scatter it about The Riverside for the brave souls who end up as the stewards of this place when we’re gone. I might slip ‘em a bottle or two of gin as well - for as sure as there are ghosts at The Riverside, they’ll need all the help they can get.