Tag Archives: Florida

Key West – Underwater Swimmers School

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Underwater Swimmer School - class photo - Key West, Florida

First Underwater Swimmers School Class 1 November 1954

I’m working on a history for my dad about his 20 years in the navy. This is a huge project but right now I’m focusing on the years he was stationed in Key West as an instructor at the Underwater Swimmers School there. He is going to a reunion in May and he wants to take this chapter of his history with him. I’m struggling with getting this together and time is slipping by on me. I think it is the writing that is my road block. Writing is not one of my strengths but I don’t see away around it. Putting together histories for my mom is easier in many ways. She doesn’t expect much in the way of narrative. She is looking more for a gathering of documents, photos and letters. My dad wants something readable. Which is ultimately what I want to. I just feel very inadequate to write it.

I have lots of photos and documents. I have a few memories from my dad so far. I have a rough outline of how I want to structure the book.

  • Prologue: brief history of diving and scuba in the US Navy
  • Chapter One: organizing of the Underwater Swimmers School
  • Chapter Two: first class
  • Chapter Three: challenges
  • Chapter Four: successes
  • Chapter Five: ongoing improvements
  • Epilogue: maturing of the Underwater Swimmers School

To get moving forward I’ve made the goal to do some sort of rough text for the chapters, one each day, this week. I did some research today on history of scuba and the navy. Tomorrow I will work on chapter one.

What do you do to help you work through mental or emotional blocks? Do you have any strategies to help me move forward?

Photos from Florida

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Apex at the Office with a Christmas tree

I love it when I see that I’ve gotten mail from either Apex or Banta’s handlers. Tonight I had one in my inbox from Florida. It was photos of Apex from Christmas. We sent all the puppies in our lives a nylabone wishbone. As puppies they all loved the wishbone shape the best. In a previous email Sue said he was enjoying the bone but was mostly tossing it around and chasing it. Banta’s handler said that she really liked it better than another nylabone she had because it was smaller and her mouth fit around it better. Well anyway Sue sent photos of Apex with his wishbone and one at work with a Christmas tree. So here they are.

Apex on the couch with his wishbone
Apex chewing on his wishbone

Spelling Lessons Needed

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We got the following email today from Apex’s handler. Part of her job is helping with a grade school. Emails like this just make my day!



GoodAfternoon,
Ijust returned from working in the K-4 class where “your son” sat in the lap ofa child.  The child knew he was a LAB (he has one at home)  and toldApex that “he should know how to spell by now.  He was not a LAP dog andto get off”.  Needless to say – the adults in the room roared and Apexlooked as if to say “What?”  (we- the class- had been working on aspelling lesson)
Tooprecious…

Couldyou please provide spelling lessons in the future?

Good News!

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Apex using his blanket as a pillow while hanging out at the hospital with Sue’s Dad

Sue called to day with great news. The pathology came back today and the results were good. They got clean margins. That means that they got all the cancer! They will be watching him closely but everything looks good. They super glued his incision shut now that they know that they don’t have to go back in. The staples will come out on the 30th. I found out that when Apex went in for surgery they had decided that if when they got in there the cancer was into the bone they would take his leg and if it had progress further they would go ahead and put him down. Oh that must have been such a difficult decision to make. I’m sure that it was the right thing to do but it must have been so hard to send me to surgery knowing that she might not see him again.

I’m so grateful and feel so blessed that Apex has made it through this challenge in such a good way. It turned out that his having an ear infection was such a great blessing. If he hadn’t gone into the vet when he did the outcome of this would probably have been much different. Yeah Apex! Heal quickly you strong handsome boy.

Update on Apex’s Surgery

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Apex in All his Glory in the middle of the bed

We got this email on how Apex’s surgery went today:

The vet called and she is done with surgery today.  She removed a melonballer sized of muscle from his leg.  The pathology report will be what tells us if she got it all or if it was encapsulated or not.  If not- we will go back to surgery on Tuesday if need be.  For now – I am going to get him and take him home.  He will be on pain meds for the weekend so he should rest and heal.  I have a to-do list that I can tackle while I am home with him.
I will let you all know more when I get home from the vets on Tuesday night.
Thanks for the prayers !

Apex is having Surgery

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Apex hanging out at the hospital with Sue and her dad

We got some shocking news from Sue about Apex today. He is having surgery on Friday. On Wednesday night she took him to the vet because she thought he might have an ear infection. Well her vet is very careful with Apex and so she checked him over carefully while he was there and she found a “wart” on his knee that she didn’t like the “feel” of. So she tested it and found it to be a cancerous lesion with a wide base.

So he goes is at 7 a.m. tomorrow morning to have it removed and hopefully get a good clean margin. They took a sample yesterday and it came back as a “stranded” irregular cell structure (aka: fast growing tentacle style cancer). They have a specialist coming in from University of Florida tonight to check him over and be there for the surgery tomorrow. I know he is the best of hands.

Poor Sue. Her dad’s funeral was just a couple of weeks ago after a couple of months of being with him day and night at the hospital or care center. She is emotionally already stretched and to have this on top of it has got to be so hard. I’m am reeling from this myself. It brings back so many of the emotions of when Shadow our pet dog was diagnosed with cancer, also a fast growing type. Sue has asked us to pray for them including the vet who is also a christian and welcomes the help. I’ve decided to fast for the next 24 hours. I don’t want this to be the end of Apex’s career. But it would be better for him to loose his leg than for him to loose his life so young. He is only three years old. That is way to young. 

Graduation Anniversary

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One year ago today we were in Boring, Oregon for Apex’s graduation. What happy memories I have of that day. When it was over I just couldn’t stop smiling, I was so happy to see Apex and his new companion and was a wonderful match GDB had made. Today we have gotten to know Sue much better and have confirmed that they are truly a great team. They had there follow-up with GDB this weekend and everything went very well. The rep said Apex was doing great and was well adjusted. She was amazed at how well the two of them work together and how well bonded they are. They did so well on their evaluation that unless a problem crops up they will probably do the check by phone. 

Apex relaxing with Sue

Kennedy Space Center

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Today we drove out to Kennedy Space Center. Sue’s parents drove because we could all fit in their van. It was good to get out of the city and see some of the Florida countryside. The space shuttle wasn’t out today. They had moved it inside to fix some problems with the fuel tank. The KSC doesn’t use any tax money in the operation of the visitor center. It runs off the ticket prices which aren’t cheap but I like the idea that it pays for itself.

Apex guiding Sue at Kennedy Space Center

Sue and Apex with an Astronaut

We saw two 3-D movies on the IMAX screens. One on the Hubble Telescope and the other on the Space Station. On the first one we got to go in first (guide dog privileges). Sue didn’t go to the second one because the first one effected her limited vision and was threaten to give her a migraine.

Alligator at Kennedy Space Center

I got to see my first alligator in the “wild” by the lake behind the movie theater. They have an retire shuttle there that you can get into part of it. I imagined the cargo bay to be much bigger. Bill and I and Amanda stood in line for awhile to go on the shuttle simulator. It was really cool and not at all scary like roller coasters.

Raelyn and Bill with Apex under the Space Shuttle

After the Space Center we drove to Dixie Crossroads, a seafood restaurant that is her families favorite. I think that was one of the main reasons her parents wanted to come today. They are famous for their rock shrimp so I ordered that and Bill ordered crab legs and then we split them so we got to eat both. It was very, very good. The also serve little cornbread doughnut holes with powdered sugar on them that were so tasty. I had to restrain myself so I’d have room for the rest of my dinner.

Sue and her family at Dixie Crossroads

Another wonderful day in Florida. I hated to see it end because who knows when we will get to see Apex again. We stopped Sue’s house before we went back to the hotel so we could see Apex in his spiffy red sunglasses. It was hard to leave but we know that Apex is in good hands, that he loves is life and that he is well loved in return. We couldn’t be happier about his partnership with Sue and she seems to be very satisfied with his work as a guide dog.

Apex in his red sunglasses

Quiet Sunday Afternoon

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We were going to go to church with Sue and Apex but it turned out to not be a great Sunday for visitors so I looked up on the internet the closest LDS ward to her house and we went to church their. It was a big ward with quiet a few Portuguese speaking members.

Apex hanging out in his back yard

After church we went to Sue’s house for a relaxed meal with her daughter and brother. We had steak and pasta with a fruit crisp and ice cream for dessert. Apex got to have one of his special doggy ice creams too. After lunch we went out in the yard to watch Apex run around. Sue has a kumquat tree in her back yard so we got to see what they taste like. They are rather sour, like a lemon, but have more of an orangy flavor. I like them.

birds at the lake

Then we drove a couple of miles to a lake to feed the ducks. Bill did all the feeding but the egrets ate the most. The ducks didn’t seem too hungry and the geese were rather slow coming a quick to leave if anything startled them. There were also some sea gull, (they are different than the California gulls we have around here) and a squirrel kept watch over everything up in a tree.

egrets at the lake

It was a such a nice, peaceful day, perfect for a Sunday. 

Holy Land Experience

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On Saturday we went with Sue and her daughter (and Apex of course) to the Holy Land Experience. We got to see how Apex worked with lots of people around. They have a replica of the Tabernacle that the children of Israel used when they were wandering in the wilderness. It was interesting to see the reenactment of what the priests did in the temple. The other part I really liked was the Scriptorium where they presented a history of the Bible with lots of old scriptures including some pages of a Gutenberg Bible.

Apex in harness

Apex is such a lucky dog. Sue takes such good care of him. She brings snacks for him of fresh fruit and/or veggies everyday. He eats a dog food with no preservatives so she can only get 20 lbs at a time. Every time she goes to get more dog food the vet checks Apex over to makes sure that he is doing well and monitors his weight. Sue hopes that Apex will be able to be her guide for ten years. He just might make it with how well she takes care of him.

Apex getting pea pods for a snack

We had committed to go to the Top Dog banquet that evening so we headed back to the hotel late in the afternoon and just before we were going to turn left and Sue and her daughter were going to turn right, a car from a side street pulled out to make a left hand turn right in front of both of our cars. Amanda was able to miss the other car and Bill almost got stopped but we still hit the other car.

Our rental car with the bumper hanging off after the acident

After all the police reports etc. were done (the driver of the other car got a ticket), Sue called her dad to bring us something to tie the bumper back on the car so we could drive it back to the rental company and get a different car. They are such kind and generous people. We feel so lucky that Apex is part of such a great family. It was nice to have some moral and physical support with local knowledge when things went wrong. Because of that what could have been a very stressful experience was just an inconvenience.

We ended up being only a few minutes late for the banquet. They had a really good speaker, Kathy Nimmer, the author of the book “Two Plus Four Equals One”. She shared stories from her book about the partnership between service dogs and their handlers. She had us all laughing and crying. At one point one of the dogs their even spoke up to put in their opinion. It was great.