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Well, it’s definitely been a tiring week with a new dog in the house. But there’s good news! Friday, Dylan stopped randomly attacking Lola and now limits it to (so far) once a day, and when she has gone after food she shouldn’t have (e.g., on the street). But they are now able to be on the couch together without incident. Also, on a walk, Dylan and Adam were a block ahead of Lola and me. Dylan stopped, sat and waited for us to catch up! What?!? And even more surprisingly, he turned into the enforcer. Whenever I correct Lola for like, trying to eat food off the table, Dilly comes running up to her like, “You heard her!”. No attacks and barely a growl.

We can see Lola progress too. She’s learning to sit and happily goes into her crate for food or treats. They’re been a couple potty incidents, but it’s only because she didn’t get out in a reasonable time, not willy nilly peeing everywhere. She’s still learning to walk on lead and has shown some food aggression to me. I got my third and biggest bite from her this morning when I was putting her food in the crate. She desperately tried to get it as I was putting it in, so I tried pushing her back until the bowl hit the ground. Instead she bit me, good too, on my left index finger cutting a 1/4 inch gash. I tried a second time to put the bowl down, she got aggressive but backed down after a stern correction. She’s not like this every feeding, but I have noticed that it’s been when she’s extremely hungry. I suppose it’s a reaction from her time as a stray.

I met the old hippie at the Santa Barbara Beach last August. He was asking for a “dollar donation” to take his photo. So I took a bunch of frames, then realized I didn’t have have a dollar, but I did have a 1 euro coin! $0.50 gain!

Lola just loves EVERY person she meets and tries really hard with Dylan. But Dilly still terrorizes her. He’s laid off a bit, but today, he jumped her 3 times – all when we walking. That’s it. We have to keep them separated since he just winds her up.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother — a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

Growing up in the South, I’ve heard my parents say many simplistic and deragatory comments about African-Americans. What boggled me, outside of the naive comments themselves, was that they had a few black friends, so did I, so did my brother. In my parents minds, they were able to separate their friends and ours as “different from the rest of the blacks.” I totally disagreed with them and even today, point out their gaffes, and hate that my parents, who grew up in the Philippines, never meeting a black person until coming to the States, had been filled with American racial stereotypes. What do I do? Disown them for that? With everything else they’ve taught me? Some would say, and the talking heads on CNN discussed it, well, you can’t get away from family, but you sure can choose your Church. Obama’s condemned the Rev. Wright’s statements, but explained his relationship with him.

Why associate myself with Rev. Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church?

And I confess that if all that I knew of Rev. Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and YouTube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way

But the truth is, that isn’t all that I know of the man. The man I met more than 20 years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor.

He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine, who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God’s work here on Earth — by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.

The path is to understand the many shades of not only a person, but this country and to work together to better the situation for all.

Here’s the full transcript.