Jak The Schnauzer Has Left Us Today

Jak lived in my family since the day he turned 3 months old, 13 years, 6 months and one day. He would have been 14 years old on June 16, 2016.

Here is his picture on his 13th birthday, June 16, 2015

I groomed him that day and right in the middle of the haircut which I admit, both of us always hated to do, he just collapsed because his little legs got so tired. That's when I knew that he would not make it to his 14th birthday.

Back in Russia in 1983-1986 I worked in the biggest library in Perm area in the department of foreign languages and one day I came across a beautifully illustrated book about different pure breeds of dogs. That's when I saw a picture of a Miniature Schnauzer for the first time in my life, and it was love at the first sight. 

The father of my children and I had trouble conceiving and wanted children so very much. It was nerve wracking and in October 1986 we agreed that if the next month we were not pregnant, we would get a Miniature Schnauzer puppy. We got pregnant, did not have time and energy for a puppy and now I have two wonderful young people for children.

When after moving to US in 2000 we were 'discovering' the country, and moved for jobs to Alpharetta, we paid a visit to a Petland store where they let people play with puppies in little rooms. Excellent marketing tactic. That's where we saw this little male Mini Schnauzer who all 3 of us started playing with right away. We decided to call him Jack. My husband at the time asked me 'do you want him?' Without a second of delay I said 'YES' - what kind of question that is anyway? That was September 16, 2002 and our new puppy went home with us that evening. Later we found out that his father's name was Jak (abbreviation for Just Another Kirkland - the breeder's family name was Kirkland), and decided to register our puppy with that same spelling. 

So now you see how special was my Jak - I waited for him 16 years. He was such a good dog! He loved riding in the car and traveled with us to New Orleans, North Myrtle Beach, Chapel Hill, Englewood, FL. 

(Englewood, FL November 23, 2007)

Always waited for me to come home and met me with excitement and a stuffed toy in his mouth ready to play with me. When he was much younger that is. But even a couple of days ago I saw him do the same thing even though he was moving slowly and looked very disoriented being so old, weak and miserable.

He could not clime stairs since September and I carried him upstairs for the night. He moved less and less and stayed in his bed longer and longer.

About five weeks ago when I came home form work I found him completely helpless in his bed, his breathing was shallow and labored. I thought I would lose him that night, but he continued to struggle to breathe and deteriorated it seemed daily. Soon he started having seizures which lasted about a minute but were not frequent. Within last two weeks his condition became significantly worse, and yesterday I did research on pet euthanasia.

I read about making a decision to euthanize your pet on the first site I visited and realized two things: 

• Jak has run out of life, he had only painful miserable existance left for him 
• I am the only one who can have mercy on my dog

It is often tempting, at this point, to postpone a decision still longer by deciding to "let nature take its course." Before choosing that course of action (or inaction), however, it's important to understand that, as a pet owner, you have been thwarting the "course of nature" from the beginning. By ensuring that your pet has food and shelter and is protected from predators, you have already guaranteed that nature will not take its course. By providing medical treatment, you have prolonged the life of your pet far beyond what it could have expected if left to "nature." In nature, an animal that becomes too ill to obtain food or protect itself will perish quickly, though not necessarily comfortably. 

Nor does nature necessarily offer an "easy" death even if you choose to let it "take its course" in the comfort of your home. An animal that cannot breathe easily, cannot eat or digest food properly, cannot control its bodily functions, and can scarcely move or enjoy human contact because of pain, is hardly dying "comfortably."

I called around and made my choices of places to use services at. An appointment was made for 10:30AM on March 18, 2016 and we had one last night and morning to spend together.

Jak crawled over me in the middle of the night and slept in my left arm pit like he did as a puppy. He spent the rest of the night there with his head on my chest.

Before we left I walked him one last time but all he did was have a seizure once outside ...

For his last meal I hand-fed him steamed broccoli which I only recently discovered he loved and a whole banana. His belly was full. I also gave him a Milk bone treat right before I handed him to the technician at Humane Society, which he hungrily grabbed.

The picture in the car was taken about 20 min before he passed away. When the technician first saw him, she asked if he was conscious - yes, he was, and that's how he looked...

They wrapped Jak's bed with his body in it in their own blanket and I thought it was good that the injection was made without us present. 

When we arrived to the pet crematorium they offered us to say good by to the body and actually it felt good to see him so peaceful. 

Strangely enough it was comforting to feel his soft warm little body under my hand...

The pic in his bed in a basket was taken at the crematorium before they made a clay paw print for us (my daughter asked for one with just ink on paper, but this is what they do for pet owners). The picture above is how my son and I saw Jak for the last time.

In the last 6 months Jak was very far from being the dog in the video (September 2013), I had to let him go.

I went through his belongings and chose a couple keepsakes. I looked through all of my photographs and put all of pictures of Jak with his Pedigree and his Petco sweater. I paid a visit to his vet and provided them with paperwork for Jak's final services so they can close his file and archive it.

I will ship his paw print to my daughter tomorrow, I am glad that we took both Jak and my new cat Cynthia with us when we visited her last Christmas, when Jak looked like this and did not bother to play with Cynthia.

(December 25, 2015)

(November 2015 with Cynthia, my cat)

I made a decision to write this post because just one picture on Facebook will not be enough for me, I had a very special dog with a very special story.

We all loved Jak very much. He lived with us since the day he turned 3 months old, 13 years, 6 months and one day. He was 13 years, 9 months and one day old.

Here's my sweet loving protective Jak The Schnauzer when he was younger and strong.

Rest In Peace Jaky-Pooh...

(March 2012)

(January 2011)

(January 2011)

(June 2010 with Ginger-Snap, my daughter's kitten)

(August 2012)

(June 2012)

(March 2015)

(June 2014)

(February 2014)

(December 2013)

(November 2013)

(July 2013)

(July 2013)

(June 2013)

(June 2013)

(June 2013)

(May 2013, North Myrtle Beach)

(September 2011)

(October 2009)

What Exactly Did Adam Do Wrong?

Last Saturday I went to pick up a couple of books from Barnes & Noble.

Did you ever have the experience, when teaching someone something they have never done before, you say things like ‘keep the main thing the main thing’ or ‘take care of big rocks first’ or ‘work off your calendar, not your email’ and it takes you back to those times when you were in training yourself and learned, sometimes the hard way, to be efficient? I have a feeling you know what I mean by that.

So, the book store visit was about picking up 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey. I have never  read it, but went through training 7 Habits for Managers some 4 years ago or so.

It’s about time I actually have the original book and read it, I thought, so off to the book store I went.

On the way there I remembered that I also need For Women Only for my friend because this particular book by Shaunti Feldhahn never stays on my bookshelf  for too long – I keep giving it away.

So I found it on BN website and took a screen shot of it for a BN associate to help me locate it in the store. That was a smart move because the associate actually went and got them for me, that's why including the long line to pay for the books, all I had to spend in the store was 10 minutes at the most.

I got both of my books and back home I went.

It was For Women Only, that reminded me (without even opening it) that all those things Shaunti is writing about, in every man’s mind are unique to him and him only. Every man thinks that he is the only one who struggles with those things, and thinks those thoughts.

That’s where I got the idea, that a person very dear to my heart might think that irresponsibility issue is unique to him only.

I had an aha moment about male irresponsibility issue earlier that day, and before taking my dear person to the passage of scripture which I hoped would clarify things in his own life for him, I decided to ask him if indeed I understood correctly the vicious cycle he has been stuck in for the last 7 years.

Yep, I was correct about the merry-go-round, and proceeded to read Genesis 3:1-12 to him.

Genesis 3New International Version (NIV)The Fall3 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”
4 “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God,knowing good and evil.”6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”
10 He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”11 And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”12 The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”

The irresponsibility issue started back then and not with my dear person at all. Verse 12 says it all (my interpretation): this woman, (who, by the way, you have given me) gave me the fruit to eat, and I just went with the flow and ate it, without giving it any thought whatsoever.

As I finished reading the scripture and said that it surely looks to me like a refusal to take any responsibility at all, I said:

'see, it is not just you, every man has this struggle in his life to some extent. This struggle is there since back then (Genesis 3 that is). 

As he listened to me telling him, that I know for sure that he knows what the right thing is, and that he is supposed to do it, he looked at me and said ‘but there is no motivation to do it, and I don’t know why’.

The answer I gave him was very simple:

‘Because it requires making an effort rather than going with the flow. Going with the flow is easy, it’s being irresponsible, that’s the base level from which all man’s problems stem. Once you make an effort to do the right thing, your body will produce endorphin and you will feel good. Isn’t that the purpose?’ 

I am amazed at how God led me from one thing to another that day to bring me to the revelation of what exactly Adam’s sin was and how it affects all men, including my dear person who I love so much.

21-Day No-Complaint Challenge

A big part of this past year was about learning. I was reading books from my book shelf, and not only those books, and learning.

Today my pastor told a story which might ring true for you as well. Regardless of your faith affiliation (or absence of such), you will recognize the pattern, as I am sure you have seen plenty of it in your life.

So, here’s the story:

It is a good practice to have a prayer team gather together in a church building on regular basis and pray together for the needs of the people in the church and for everyone who is involved in the ministry. 

But when they call for a prayer meeting, 3 people show up. Why so? People say ‘we really don’t know how to pray’. Offering a class on how to pray seems to be a great idea. So the pastor starts a class, 25 people show up and actually faithfully finish the class. 

What’s interesting though, when a prayer meeting is called again, only 3 people out of 25 show up for it. 

Wait a minute, wasn’t the point of the class to teach people how to pray so when it’s time for a prayer meeting, there is actually a prayer team, educated and ready for action? Yes, of course! 

But more people want to learn something and very few want to actually act upon that knowledge.

My pastor went on to read the scripture from the Bible which talks about living in accordance to what we have learned so far. It is not easy, is it? Nope, but it’s worth the effort.

I am telling the whole story here because it directly relates to reading the books on my shelf and then implementing what I learn in my daily life.

I will take you all the way back to September 2014 when I posted here last time before I came back today, and back track everything that happened in my life since then in the posts that will follow.

For right now, I will write about what’s on my heart now that I’ve started reading ‘What’s It Like To Be Married To Me?’ just the day before yesterday.



I just finished Chapter 2 and something really grabbed my attention. I knew for quite some time that the complaining of the Jewish people kept them in the desert for 40 years. But what I read today made me look in the mirror and actually do something to make changes in my life, in me.

Linda Dillow, the author of this book gave her dialog with God about griping, grumbling and whining. Of any kind.

Here’s what I learned from it: God considers grumbling as sinful as immorality. He says it’s as bad as adultery.

What we usually do is go tell people what we dislike so much. Those people cannot do anything about what we dislike. But we go and bring our complaints to them. Not to God, who actually CAN do a lot about it.

I loved this quote by C. H. Spurgeon Linda included in this chapter:

We do not show our trouble to the Lord that He may see it, but that we may see Him. It is for our relief and not for His information, that we make plain statements concerning our troubles. It does us much good to list our sorrows.

She offered a challenge which I have accepted with enthusiasm: 21-Day No-Complaint Challenge.

The whole book is about building a healthy marriage relationship. I am not married. But I can easily apply what I learn from this book to my other relationships. I see it as a great opportunity for practice: if I am to marry for a fourth time, then I have been working on myself, I do not want to waste time now.

So, here are the steps to take:

1. I go to God alone and pour out my complaints.
2. I make a secret choice to accept the other person.
3. I move from ‘Change THEM, Lord’ to ‘Change ME Lord’.
4. I wear my ‘Gripes Be Gone’ bracelet.

About the last point – part of the challenge is to switch my bracelet from one wrist to the other every time I gripe instead of talking to God about it.

My friend gave me this bracelet some time ago. This is what I choose to wear, not a rubber one, but this gift from a person who loves me and accepts me.

Want to join me in the challenge?