All Star Grooming

Sometimes “I’m fine” is just the quickest way to end a conversation you’re not ready to have. 😅🖤

Our hearts are with every family, first responder, and community affected by the devastating fires across the Spokane and North Idaho area. ❤️

If you have been displaced or are being forced to evacuate, please don’t worry about your pets.

All Star Grooming is offering temporary shelter and pet care for animals belonging to families impacted by the fires. Whether you need a safe place for your pet for a few hours or a few days while you get situated, we’re here to help however we can.

We know that during times like these, pets are family. Our goal is to give you one less thing to worry about while you focus on keeping yourself and your loved ones safe.

Please message us directly or call us at (509) 859-5195 if you or someone you know needs assistance. Even if we reach capacity, we’ll do everything we can to help connect you with additional resources.

Please join us in praying for everyone’s safety—for the families who have been evacuated, those who have lost homes, the firefighters and emergency personnel working tirelessly, and for rain to bring these fires to an end.

Stay safe, everyone. We’re all in this together. ❤️🐾

— The All Star Grooming Family

Paper-Thin

Today I nicked a cat.

After more than twenty years of grooming, those words still catch in my throat.

The cut was only about an inch long.

An inch.

A blade against skin that had become as fragile as tissue after fourteen years of life and the quiet weight of time.

Paper-thin.

Her skin was paper-thin.

So paper-thin that the line between helping and hurting disappeared in a heartbeat.

I sat there looking at her, wondering how something so small could feel so impossibly heavy.

We spend our lives believing strength is loud.

But it isn’t.

Strength is often paper-thin.

The old Persian weighed almost nothing.

Matted hair had wrapped around her body until her legs and belly were no longer separate. Beneath the coat was a body that had been carrying more than anyone realized.

Paper-thin.

Her skin.

Her body.

The distance between comfort and pain.

As I continued her groom, something else caught my attention.

Her mouth.

The smell.

The swelling.

A whisper.

Animals whisper before they scream.

I called her owner and told them I was taking her to the veterinarian. They met me there.

The cut I couldn’t stop replaying in my mind quickly became the smallest part of the day.

Hidden beneath everything else was a severe oral infection.

A life quietly unraveling beneath the surface.

Paper-thin.

The space between ordinary and emergency.

The space between tomorrow and never.

I drove home thinking about that phrase.

Paper-thin.

How often we move through life believing there is another tomorrow, another chance, another appointment, another hug, another phone call.

Until there isn’t.

We are all paper-thin sometimes.

A body holding on by determination.

A marriage held together by hope.

A heart surviving another disappointment.

A parent trying not to fall apart.

A child pretending to be okay.

Paper-thin.

The people we pass every day may be paper-thin.

The animals who can’t tell us they’re hurting may be paper-thin.

Even we, beneath the smiles we’ve practiced for years, may be paper-thin.

That old Persian didn’t remind me how easily skin can tear.

She reminded me how easily life can.

Maybe that’s why I still think about her.

Not because I nicked a cat.

But because, for one quiet afternoon, she reminded me that every living thing carries a hidden fragility.

And if we’re paying attention…

Paper-thin isn’t something to fear.

It’s something to honor.

Because knowing how fragile life is should make us gentler with it.

With animals.

With each other.

With ourselves.

Hello friends!

Journi Johnson has been the most amazing assistant and dryer at All Star Grooming for many years! She has decided that retirement is in her very near future.

Journi will continue in-home pet sitting services and comes highly recommended with plenty of references!

Journi Johnson Gizmo loves ❤️

Sylvester and Stallone

Bird love at the salon 💜