It's Cold. I Hurt.

I don't have to sit on a thermometer to know it's cold. My joints tell me that. But I've come to enjoy the process of identifying a certain kind of pain and then working to eliminate it - temporarily.

Other kinds of pains don't go away. Ever.

If the pain in my hip won't let me scratch my ear and there's nobody around I can con into scratching it for me, I stretch my hip by putting my butt in the air so I can squeeze out the pain, and something more aromatic if I've had Alpo within the last four hours. Then I can scratch my ear.

I'm not sure if this makes sense for humans - stretching and farting -- but for dogs it's pure pleasure to get rid of pain this way -- better than never having had the pain in the first place. The sense of accomplishment (remember we can't drive BMWs or quilt) is intoxicating, and the peace of no pain is Theta-wave great. It's the kind of feeling I get when I take enough of a nip out of one of the kids to make her realize she's crossed the line, but not enough to get me shot -- as long as I'm not in Texas.

Dealing with the kind of pain that doesn't ever go away, like the pain in my front shoulders, is a matter of mind, not muscle, and it can't be stretched away.

Sometimes I just feel better if I can get angry at someone, and around here, that's fairly easy because, with all the overnight couriers, I'm no longer restricted to the mailman (mail person in the liberal Northeast), and the odd meter reader.

Sometimes I feel better when I'm nice to someone.

Knowing whether to be nice or nasty goes a long way toward dealing with constant pain. Being nasty seems to produce adrenaline and cortisol, and being nice produces endorphins, all of which take away the pain from the mind's point of view. But if you get it wrong and you're nasty when you should be nice, or vice versa, the chemical brain-cocktail turns volatile and pain gets worse. Humans call it guilt when you're nasty instead of nice, and "being used" when you nice instead of nasty. When dogs get it wrong, although we'd really like to smell your butt, we just lick your face, and you seem to really enjoy it.