In the past several weeks, after his diagnosis of brain cancer, I’ve watched the life of Ed and Carol Gulley’s life go to pieces right in front of me.They are a farm family, and a close-knit family, and they have all pulled tightly together to help each other – and Ed – get through it.
Ed, a powerful and active man, is now almost completely confined to a hospital bed, he has little or no use of his left side, and he spends much of the day asleep. He insists that he is in control of this cancer, and is at peace with it.
He says he knows where this is all heading, but he is not ready to go, and he say she is not yet in any pain and is not suffering.
I take him at his word. One of things we can still do together as friends is talk about creativity and Ed’s burgeoning life as an artist, cut rather brutally short. But he is still going. He sketches during the day, he writes poems every day, they are his messages to the outside world, his creative spark burns brightly, he is not willing to let go of it.
It is, I think, his last testament to the world.
Today I stood over him as he used his good hand to sketch some small apples on a tree, a sight he has been seeing his whole life. Tonight, I’m putting three of his sketches up for sale. They are below. If you want one, please e-mail me at [email protected]. I will sell them in the order the three e-mails are received. Ed says he wants to do more.
When I get the e-mails, I’ll send payment instructions., I can’t promise to give each person the sketch he or she wants, or answer all of the messages, it depends on how many there are, and there are only three sketches for sale. Here they are:
Three Prints. Top – Small Red Apples, Vase With Flowers (right.) Bottom row, Hedgerow Vine.
Yesterday, I brought Ed some big fat colored felt marker pens and some non-bleed paper for him to work with. I encouraged him to use more color and thicker pens. Ed has full use of his right hand and arm, but no longer can use any part of the left side of his body, he says he just doesn’t know where he leg and arm is anymore.
He can’t take the top off of the markers, so when he works, I stand alongside of him and hand him the markers he wants to use, then put them back in the bowl Carol brought us when he does. It is laborious for him and tiring. And I need to stand close.
After two or three sketches, he is exhausted. But it is also rewarding for me, I feel especially close to Ed when we work together like this.
This morning, Beverly, a blog reader from Illinois, messaged me to say she would like to buy one of the sketches, and wanted to pay me $100 for one. I asked Ed, and he said sure, and we set to work to make some.
We had a sweet and productive time. In the process, three new sketches were done, and I am putting each one of them up for sale for $100.
Every dollar will, of course, go to the Gulleys. We only did three of these today, there may or may not be more, I think there will be more, but I can’t promise that. Every day with Ed is different. If anyone is interested, e-mail me at jon@bedlamfarm, and I will choose to sketches for sale in the order in which the e-mails come in.
I can’t guarantee you the one you might ask for, just one of the three to each of the first three people who e-mail me. Payment will come once the orders are accepted, I’ll give instructions when I get the e-mails, which should include s-mail addresses.
No payments are necessary or should be sent until you are notified by me that you are getting one of the prints. I may not be able to respond individually to everyone who wants a Gulley sketch.
Ed is an a artist as well as a farmer and his creative spark is strong and fighting to live. These sketches are a pure representation of him.
Here are the signed sketches:
The upper left sketch represents Small Red Apples, the top right is a Vase With Flowers, and the bottom is a Hedgerow Vine.
From Buddy To “Bud” Photo by Carol Johnson/Friends Of Homeless Animals, Rhode Island.
We made our first decision about Buddy tonight, we have decided to change his name to “Bud.”
In the final analysis, it was pretty simple. We needed and wanted a dog. Bud needs and presumably wants a good and loving home. I don’t know nearly as much about this dog as I usually know about the dogs I get.
When I look at his photo, I see a thoughtful, even mournful soul. He has quiet eyes. Boston Terriers always look older than their years, and life has taught this dog a lot.
I was prepared to bitch and moan about all the steps I had to take, but Carol Johnson talked to me and defanged me and listened to me and reasoned with me, and soon enough, I was purring like a kitten. They are well worth visiting if you are looking to rescue a dog.
I know Gus is very sick. I know he was terrified of men, and may still be. I know he is one year old and that he was not wanted or treated well, and was abandoned outdoors. I know I got him from a conscientious and wary group of dog lovers that had me jump through a number of hoops to get him.
As expected, the rescue group put me through a small-scale Inquisition.
I swallowed my pride, and put my big boy shoes on, and behaved. They have their reasons.
After all, I have nothing to hide. They asked me to list all of the dogs I have ever euthanized and I listed every single one and added: ” I will never permit any dog of mine to suffer great pain beyond reason so I can feel better.”
That was okay.
I gave them the four references, as requested, our vet and three other people, and by the end of the day, they had called every one of them and grilled me as to my canine character and sense of responsibility. I am grateful that people said such nice things about me and my dogs.
I balked at their efforts to come check out the farmhouse, it seemed a bit Stalinist to me, I referred them to my books and my blog and said I would be happy to send them photos and videos. That seems to be working.
Carol from the rescue group called me this afternoon to tell me I had passed my tests with flying colors and they were finally very excited about my getting Bud, who will come in several months after his heartworm and other treatments are finished, and he is recovered and whole. Looks like August or September.
The group will be responsible for bringing him up to the Northeast where I will be able to go pick him up with Maria. She is as excited as I am about Bud.
In a sense, Bud is Gus’s final gift to us, Gus opened our eyes to these wonderful dogs and paved the way. When I look at Bud’s photo, I am sure he will also make us smile, and he will spend many happy hours in Maria’s very warm and loving lap. Maybe mine also.
I have the name of his Arkansas vet – that is where he is – if I need to call. I don’t think I do need to call, I asked to be informed about his treatment.
Like Gus, Bud will be a dog, not a toy or furbaby.
I am uneasy with labels, on dogs or people – left or right, rescue or adopted or bought, big or small – the dogs don’t need them, they are just another way humans have of tagging and stereotyping things.
I have been so lucky in my choice of dogs – “rescued” dogs, bred dogs, shelter dogs – I feel lucky about Bud, and I have no interested in labeling him further, despite his hard luck and rough treatment. He is not a rescue dog. He is not a purebred dog. He is not a shelter dog. He is not an abused dog. He is not a small dog.
He is a dog.
And he will be treated lovingly, humanely and sensitively. We will be loving him all day. And he will know that.
If the winter weather is too cold, he will stay inside or wear winter gear. If it is hot, he will not run around outside or get heated up too much. He will be given the chance to ride with us everywhere he goes, and if it’s warranted, I would love to teach him how to be a therapy dog.
I am not bothered by reports that he is sometimes terrified of men. So am I. They are quite often dangerous and scary, just look at the news.
We are both wussy men it seems, we will know and love one another. If I flipped Frieda, I can flip him. This dog really needs a good home, and I love being needed, and I always need a good dog.
Red won’t care about Bud being here, or perhaps even notice. Fate will have a playmate back. A number of anxious readers have messaged me worrying about Flo and Minnie. They asked if I have considered them.
Not a lot. No Boston Terrier will take out Flo or Minnie, and if Bud chases them as Gus did – Boston Terriers are not biters or killers – he will have a bloody and sore nose to remember. Gus only tried it once.
We will introduce Bud to the pasture on a leash or in our arms until everyone is acclimated to the other. If he is terrified out there, he won’t go out there. Maybe he can ride a donkey like Gus did one day. We won’t push it.
If I can be permitted to make a point, it is an oft-repeated one for me. Get the dog you want, not the dog other people tell you to get. There are good and bad rescue groups, good and bad shelters, good and bad breeders. It is on us to be the stewards of our dogs and make the best choices for them, not for us.
So here we are.
We are very happy to be getting bud, I wish we could have done this with Robin Gibbons, but the Gods of the dog world, just like the Gods of our world, have their own ideas about who gets what and when.
Thanks for coming along, this passage is just getting underway. You will see a lot of Bud on this blog.
Today, I asked Ed if he wished to talk about his childhood, his life on the farm as a child. Ed is a master story-teller, and the family farm has shaped his life as well as his illness. His family is so much a part of his brain cancer.
Ed feels better than Sunday, when we all thought he was leaving us, he is clearer and more comfortable. Still the toll of the cancer is evident, even in our videos. He has less strength and works hard to keep his energy up.
He cannot move any part of his left side, and needs help to sit up in any way. He is beginning to struggle with memory and needs frequent rest. Still, his gift for story telling remains and he reminds me all the time of what we are losing as a culture and a country as the family farms recede and will soon be gone.
Ed’s childhood was harsh and demanding by today’s standards, yet Ed believed it was a valuable learning experience for him. He tried to raise his children in the same way, and he is very happy with how they turned out.
When I listen to him tell his stories, I realize how desperate we are in our time to keep our children from having problems, in Ed’s early life, he was left alone to solve the problems of life. He says it has benefited him every day of his life, even today.
This is the seventh in our series of conversations about his life, and I thought it might be valuable to go backwards instead of forward. We took a break from
My new Red Fedora came today from Greece. I got two new hats this summer, a Panama Hat for the warm weather, a Red Fedora for the Fall and Winter. I have never owned such hats before, and I can hardly relate how much I love them.
I feel as if I am finally growing into myself. Some new diabetes medication has finally made it possible for me to lose a lot of weight, so has a new way of eating for me. And I am very pleased with my hat, it is made out of felt and comes from Greece.
