It has been a very emotional time as Lilah our pet retriever passed away. She was born July 7, 1995. A promise dog to my daughter who at the time was 16 when the promise was kept.

Lilah was the last one at the breeder who wasn't picked because she was the runt and had (bad hips,we didn't know until she had to have x-rays).. She followed my daughter around the farm before we knew that she was the one we were going to get. My daughter held her all the way home in the car.

She was a best friend to all of us because each one became her master at different times in her life. She loved each one of us and she loved her walks which I wrote about. Those men will sure miss her because she always looked for them. The walk really was cookie time.

I'll miss her more than anyone because in the last couple of years she was slowing down and needed to rest on those walks when she didn't see her favourite people. I took my camera with me and started taking pictures of the scenery. She'd lie down and I'd take pictures of the insects, flowers, greenery, wild animals. I got a lot of practice as the walk sometimes took an hour to go around just once instead of her usual three times in an hour. She smiled at everyone.

She especially loved certain people like Charlie's master who started to give her a massage because he had special gloves that dogs just loved. Or the ladies who all had different sizes of dogs and found her at the top one day when she went off exploring on her own because I was talking too long with someone.

Lilah had her yearly check up in November and a lump was discovered on her inside leg. She was now 13 and half years old and we said no to the x-rays. She was given medication for arthritis and for the parasites she had gotten because she ate goose poop which had shown up in some of her tests she had. She had blood work done also.

Monday, December 22, 2008 started out the same only she didn't want to walk at all even though I'd taken her to her favourite park. A walk to her was get in the car and drive to the park. She sat down at the entrance and looked up at a woodpecker and I took the picture of the bird. I took her home and she followed my husband around. That afternoon she suffered a seizure or convulsion. We weren't sure what it was because then she was normal again. We both cried and she responded. Only now I was watching and when she tried to stand up it happened again. Now she didn't want to lie down and kept walking only she'd tire and lie down that's when I called the vet again and at about 7:30 we brought her in. We were sent to a 24 hour animal hospital to be watched. Only she suffered several more convulsions. They had to do some tests quickly and we went and picked up our daughter who was coming home for christmas. By the time the three of us returned the x-ray showed that her lungs were filled with a cancer. Lilah knew because she didn't fight us at all about going to the vet or the animal hospital. She also knew we cared and that she was loved and appreciated.

Lilah was a gentle soul. She is missed by Trouble, Minouche, my son and his wife, my daughter and my husband. And especially by me as she was always there. Whereever I was, she was at my feet. Lilah July 7, 1995 to December 22, 2008.

My heart saddened this weekend with the news of my Canadian government forming a coalition against a minority government that was just elected.

I may be wrong in my thinking that the coalition would overtake without a new election in defeating the present situation thus making it no longer a democratic nation. Where do the people get to vote again because they don't like what is happening. That would be a democracy way instead of this coalition.

Do we realize what effect this coalition would have on our neighbors to the south, the global nations that we deal with in trades. The global markets we have already created. Also to the British commonwealth which we are still apart of until the coalition takes over.

I had hoped that this would not happen as we had discussed this possibility in history when learning about other countries whose government had been overthrown and why. Were we too busy living our lives and not see the signs that were visible. Education unrest, health issues, official language disputes, loss of the industrial market, economic hardtimes.

There is a section on Oprah website under World People and Politics called World Leader Worries... not one of the people in the article mentioned this possibility. What a shock to our neighbors and the world.