Team Hospice. Lenore and Izzy celebrate Lenore’s graduation from training, and her
appointment as a full-fledged Hospice dog. Lenore seems reflective.

February 25, 2008 – Clear, cold. Storm coming tomorrow, rain, sleet, then 6 to 10 inches. If I could afford it, I’d fly Annie to Florida. She’s earned it.
  I’ve signed up with Larry White, a well known dance photographer originally from New York City, to give me some pointers with the new camera. Got to keep learning. Didn’t learn much when I was actually in school, but it seems never to be too late. Going to keep working at it. It is not easy to take a good picture, and I get lucky once in awhile, but want to up the percentage.

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  So great news. Got twice the Hospice canine punch.
  Lenore was inducted into Hospice work at the Washington County Hospice and Palliative Care Program HQ in Ft. Edward this afternoon  by Keith Mann, good friend, and Hospice honcho and Training Co-Ordinator. She got a graduation certificate, which she nearly ate, and a plastic ID, which I will not let her eat.
  Izzy seemed vaguely discomfited by her lack of decorum, but I am very excited. She trained hard, flew through her temperament test, and did very well at four practice visits. She is genial, calm, still a bit boisterous, natural for her age, which is seven months.
  She’s going to hit a nursing home tomorrow, weather permitting. She is a very different kind of dog than Izzy, which is fine. She spreads light and cheer wherever she goes, where Izzy zeroes in for the one-on-one bonding. Both are valuable and will greatly broaden the kind of Hospice work the program can do with dogs. Great for me, too, as Lenore will challenge me to think carefully about how to use these two wonderful animals.
  Izzy has shown me the difference a dog can make, even in homes where people are dying. Lenore will show me something also, I suspect, and I can’t wait to see it and pass it along.
  Below, Lenore gets her ID and certificate. We hit the road immediately, stopping briefly at a nursing home. The patients were eating, so the dogs snuggled with nurses and we will return tomorrow, storm permitting. These two can really work a room or a nursing home.