Leap of Faith

We are in Week Five of rehab/reconditioning, and a few things have changed. The best news is that last week's consultation with Cindy Hickey of Supreme Motion fame turned up no gait abnormalities -- Viva is gaining strength, and got a "normal active dog" massage with nothing in her body screaming to be worked on. It's taken us nearly three months to get to this point. I recognize it could have taken a lot longer. Viva's injury was minor, as they go, and we've been diligently working her program. And will continue to do so, even though it now involves jumping.

Yes, that's right, Miss V. has been given the green light to resume jumping. Granted, the jumps are Corgi-sized, set to 8" instead of Viva's customary 16", but they're jumps nonetheless. Which is why I thought twice before setting up the jump chute for the first time. I mean, the art of the jump was first thing out the window when Viva injured herself. No jumps, no stairs. Zip. Nada. Niente. Can something so bad for her earlier in the summer truly be okay now? Granted, we hadn't been able to completely eliminate jumping from Viva's physical vocabulary. She has jumped the rock wall once or twice when we weren't looking. (And once or twice when we are looking on in horror.) She jumped a double set to 20" when we were working on the teeter at a friend's house. Then she kindly offered to backjump it, when she judged from our responses that the initial jump clearly hadn't been what we wanted her to do. She has, on occasion, jumped over a sleepy Labrador retriever. And one or two or twenty curbs. So what's an 8" jump chute gonna do?

Nothing, as it turns out, except make her stronger and happier. She bounced the jumps set five feet apart. Bounced the jumps set five and a half feet apart. Six feet, six and a half feet, seven . . . all fine. Piece of cake. Bring on the competition.

She will be even happier when she gets her beloved tunnel back this week. A tunnel AND a jump chute? If there's a canine version of Christmas, believe me, we're celebrating it now. Rumor has it the weave poles may make their return this week as well . . .