Here's your featured Snapshots for the month of September:
GDB alumna Kathy Peery, who works in Washington D.C., meets President Obama. Obama had just finished shaking her hand when this photo was taken. You can't see her guide, Bea, in the photo - but you can see the leash! Submitted by Kathy Peery.
Retired guide Dakota (9 years) and career change dogs Culver (9 months) and Desma (9 years) in front of Haystock Rock at Cannon Beach along the Oregon coast. Submitted Debi Hays, who has this to say about her special dogs:
"I'm a volunteer in the vet clinic on the Oregon Campus. I'm approaching my 11th year. Volunteering in the vet clinic allows me to foster dogs that come in for surgery, and that's how I met Culver. Culver had surgery to repair a liver shunt and he was staying with me during his recovery. I have fostered many dogs through the years, but Culver captured my heart. I fell in love with him immediately. Knowing Culver would be a hard dog to place because he is not expected to live a normal length of life, I talked to my husband about adopting him.
My husband, Steve, is a huge supporter of these incredible dogs and he agreed that Culver was a very special dog and that he should be with us. We had not planned on adopting a 3rd dog and certainly not a 9 month-old puppy, but it felt like the right thing to do. We are not sure why we are on this special journey with Culver, but we feel honored to be the ones to share in this experience with him. We will give him the best life possible with lots of love and the best medical care that we can. Right now, Culver is asymptomatic and doing extremely well. He acts like any normal puppy, playing with toys, chewing bones and acting silly.
Culver is teaching us that we don't know what tomorrow will bring, so seize the moment and GO DO IT, which is how we wound up at the beach. We had a break in our work schedule one week, so we thought, why not? Let's go! We were not sure if Culver had experienced the sand and surf but every puppy needs this fun adventure, don't you think??
Culver shares his life with Dakota, a retired guide who we had previously fostered, and Desma, who I raised for GDB."
Guide Dog puppy Sakari, submitted by raiser Lynn Jensen. The photo was taken at ATK-Alliant Tech Systems where Lynn is a project engineer. Lynn writes:
"You don't have to be a rocket scientist to raise a Guide Dog puppy... but what if you are? Sakari is the seventh puppy our family has raised. All of them have gone to work with me at the rocket factory (ATK-Alliant Tech Systems) in northern Utah. It is a good place for socializing and training. I believe it has helped all of them to become graduates of the program and working guides.
Our plant is so large it resembles a small city. The dogs have all been on buses and vans going to different parts of the plant, visited the cafeteria, and exposed to a variety of surfaces. We have several grates the dogs walk on and we even have a grate stairway. They are so well behaved they have attended meetings with people unaware of their presence. In one meeting after a long presentation, Sakari gave a big groan as if to say, 'I’m glad that this is over!'; someone spoke up and said, 'I think that’s how all of us feel!'
Most of the dogs have special friends whom they recognize by sight and sound. People stop to see and pet the dogs without wanting to see me. Some just sit and pet the dog and say that it lowers their blood pressure.
In the accompanying picture Sakari was with me in the control room for a rocket test firing. We are shown in the picture at the end of the motor within minutes of the test finishing."
To see the rest of the recently submitted photos,
please visit GDB's Flickr site!
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