29 March 2010

Goodbye to a Good Boy

There are many clichés when it comes to dog ownership: they are your best friends, they never judge you, and they will always forgive you.
With Charlie, all of those “clichés” were the absolute truth.
Charlie was an 11-year-old black-and-white Springer Spaniel owned by my parents. While he was always kind to us, time was not so kind to him, leaving him arthritic, incontinent, deaf and nearly blind by the time the hard decisions had to be made. We said goodbye to Charlie last Friday, and in doing so, closed a chapter of our own lives as well.
The whole family fell for Charlie pretty quickly after he came home for good in early 1999. All dogs are special in their own way, but Charlie was a real character. I’ve never met a dog that talked so much. He’d grumble and whiney when you petted him, and still acted like a lap dog even after he’d reached 70 pounds. After experiencing several birthdays, he would go crazy when he heard the song “Happy Birthday,” as he’d figured out this was a harbinger for a helping of delicious cake.
Chuck loved the garden my father worked on every spring and summer. I have fond memories of him squashing flowerbeds as he sat to lean in and smell a tulip on a nice day. It seemed to sum up his gentle nature.
Charlie had a front-row seat to the joys and sorrows of our lives. He was a comfort to me when came home from college in disgrace. He spent nearly every moment of my parent’s respective bouts with cancer by their sides. He was a constant presence in our lives, and we were always thankful for him.
As he grew older, Charlie began to show the ravages of age. He grew arthritic, and would often vocally complain about this in his own way. His vision grew poor, his hearing failed, and other health problems began to mount. We were faced with a decision no one wanted to make, and last week, the die was cast.
I stopped by Friday afternoon to see him one last time. As was his usual wont, he was relaxing in his kennel, oblivious to his upcoming rendezvous with eternity. I took him outside to get some photos, and it was obvious that, in another dog cliché, the mind was willing but the body unable to do what dog and master had once taken for granted.
I could see the pain he was in as we darted back and forth in play, and after 30 seconds or so, his whining increased to a yelp, as if to say, “Sorry, I can’t do this anymore.”
I left that day without saying anything to him, because what can you say to a creature that doesn’t understand its impending fate? I patted him on the head and turned to walk out the door, confident that I would be OK with the absence I knew was coming.
My plans went awry when my dad called me from the vet’s that afternoon. Someone had locked the keys in their car, and they needed a spare to get home. I was ushered into a peaceful room at the vet’s office, where Charlie lay on a blanket covering the floor. He died right when I walked through the doorway.
There was something unbelievably sad in seeing my friend like that. Charlie looked peaceful. I picked up his paw, and found to my surprise that the limb moved freely, having been liberated from the arthritis that constricted it. I tried shutting his eyes, and they wouldn’t stay closed. It was if he were sleeping on the kitchen rug as he’d done so many times before – only this time, there would be no waking up.
We’d done the right thing – but it was a hard decision to take. There were many tears that night. I cried not only for my friend, but also for the chapter in our lives that had closed with him. It’s hard not to notice the passage of time and the advancing years coming upon us with the speed of a freight train. Losing such a constant presence only reinforces just how little control we have over time’s giving and taking of such gifts.
That night, my parents heard a noise in the back hall and found Charlie’s kennel open kennel door had somehow shut by itself. I’d like to think this means our friend and faithful companion is not lost to us, but will always be there, at least in spirit – a gentle presence that never missed a chance to stop and smell the tulips.

02 March 2010

U.S. kids: Making the move to "constant eating"

According to a new article released today by Reuters, a new study is calling into question if our psychological need to eat is being "deregulated."

The article, "Snacks mean U.S. kids moving toward 'constant eating,'" examines how childrens' daily calorie intakes have increased by nearly 113 calories per day since the 1970s. More than 27 percent of those calories, the article states, come in the form of daily snacks, mainly "salty snacks and candy. Desserts and sweetened beverages remain the major sources of calories from snacks."

The extra calories are adding up quick, it seems. According to the 2007 National Survey of Children's Health, the obesity rate for children 10-17 was 14.8 percent in 2003. By 2007, it had jumped to 16.4 percent – an increase of nearly two points. If the same trends continue, we could logically deduce that today's childhood obesity rate is around 20 percent.

While politicians wring their hands about a crisis they can use to score face time, I think another culprit is to blame for at least some of this behavior: the food industry. I'm not meaning the people who sell apples. I'm talking about the companies like Kraft Foods, whose smiling faces-laden website nearly crashed my old computer. The company owns both Oreo and Nabisco, makers of such fine, healthy treats as Oreo cookies. Both branches have annual profits approaching $1 billion.

The extended reach of influence of these snacks' marketing prowess is capable of stirring real or imagined hunger in viewers at the drop of a hat. Years ago, cigarette ads on television were discontinued after mounting research proved that cigarettes were unhealthy. Now, they are disappearing from print, too. Why shouldn't we expect to see the same sort of regulation regarding ads that target a demographic that doesn't even know how to spell "demographics?" Has "childhood" become another marketing category on a whiteboard in some anonymous boardroom? I think it has, and that's unfortunate.

Ironically, Phillip Morris (or "Altria," the deliberately-forgettable new name it has been given) now owns both Kraft and Nabisco. I know the argument about "free will" would be bandied about, but let's face it – "free will" isn't exactly working out so hot for our kids, is it? Or that matter, for adults, whose collective waistlines (mine included) expand by the year.

I know there is a burden on consumers to regulate themselves. I know that each of us has the choice to make – to eat healthy and take care of ourselves, or to give up. But the balance of choice is upset in a day and age when food is marketed to us as a panacea for all things: a drug, a secret lover, an indulgence and a reward. We want all of those things, and marketers know that. In the end, the adults are just as bad as the kids – only the adults should know better.

I think we'd all be better served if the sort of in-your-face constant marketing we've grown up with would stop. In the end, food is many things, but at its base, it is simply a way for us to stay alive for another day. At its core, it is nothing more than sustenance – and I think it would benefit all of us to remember just exactly what that means.