I took the puppy to the vet this morning because he has these funky toes and one nail on each foot that kinda grows at an angle. I've been wondering if I'm cutting them too short or whatever so I took him in to see the vet and make sure they were okay.

Well.

My vet is very very cool and he took a look and then watched him walk a little and then reached back to stretch out his back legs and on each leg Hondo cried out. He said that it seemed the toes were at angle because Hondo is leaning forward - taking weight off his back legs due to some discomfort. So he's having x-rays to see what the scoop is. He is part German Shepherd (maybe) so hip dysplasia is always a concern. But my dog Jake had that and he was with us until he was 13. It doesn't scare me.

But not knowing - leaving my puppy (all 80 hyper pounds of him) to find out what might be wrong. It makes the heart feel unsteady for a moment - mostly I'm sure because of Tucker - but still. You wonder why you put your heart out there again and again; why there is so much in this life that threatens to break our hearts.

Or maybe I've just been watching too many episodes of Buffy. Too many times where she loves someone and then they are gone and I wonder why we keep doing this - why we put so much of our international resources into finding ways to break hearts around the world instead of everyone looking for ways to save them. Why can't we find cures instead of build bombs?

Yes, I know sometimes I can be the most naive creature on earth.

I could blame all of this a bit on Dream Factory, a book I thought was about a bunch of teenagers filling in at Disney World during a character actor strike. There's all sorts of funny in this book, especially if you know anything about Disney at all, but more than anything it is a love story and a story about Ella, who must put her heart out there again, must put it on a plate where it might get bruised or cut or bleed because she can't just keep living without that love - without any love.

Better to have loved and lost, right? (Like the guy who wrote that one has a clue just how horrific the losing part can be.)

I'm reviewing Factory right now for the summer issue of Eclectica and trying to sound intelligent about why I think it's so great. The setting is brilliant - how many crazy things can be said about working at Disney World? - and the characters are wonderful. It works on many levels but for me, it was Ella that really set it over the top. You pull for her through the whole book, hoping she will risk her heart again, hoping she will put it out on that plate.

It's all about learning to be brave that way, brave in love, either with teenage boys or puppies.