THE JOURNAL

19 August Tuesday

Emily has had a blood test.  She had a section of her front right leg shaved to accommodate the needle. She has had an Ultra Sound. Her tummy was shaved clean for that. Her tail was already shaved except for a white plume of hair at its end. Her back legs and hips and all around her bottom are shaved.  This is all in addition to her haircut of last week. Various other places around her body are worn down.  Most of these places are just a result of age. The overall effect is piebald.  Her various tests showed that she has a compromised liver.  We now have special food and pills for her, as well as a fortnight’s supply of steroids.  I wonder if the steroids will give her back her wasted leg muscles, and help her to stand herself up from a lying down position. I wonder if they will help her hair to look healthy and shiny and fluffy again. They cannot give us back a youthful dog but they can hopefully rejuvenate this old one.

20 August Wednesday

I have been drawing and drawing and re-drawing my rusted objects.  I am collecting the drawings together into a kind of inventory.  I think I am compiling an ironmongery on paper. Up until now, the found pieces have been lined up on the long bench.  Some have been hanging on the wall. Some others are on the ground opposite the bench. One is in position near my door as it has the function of helping to open that door. There are a lot of different pieces and parts. Most of them are variations of the same things.  Since everything I find here is usually agricultural in its initial use, the things are often repeats of the earlier found things.  Now I am attempting to document the same things and the differences of the same things.  It is often tedious as I am constantly feeling that my drawing has become a sort of stuttering.  While I am drawing, I stop because I think that I just drew this exact thing.  And often I did just draw that thing but it was not exactly the same thing which is why I am trying to draw it again.  I dream each night of black ink drawings of the endless variations of the same objects. It is driving me mad.