IN Upper St. Clair Spring 2014 | Page 52

LESSONS IN LIFE Through the Eyes of a Dog Children’s book author and artist Susan Castriota credits her rescue of an orphaned dog as a turning point in her life. BY EARL BUGAILE Susan Castriota can say a lot about the role that dogs have played in her life. An Upper St. Clair resident, artist, illustrator and author of five children’s books, her talents have been shared by many thousands of people. She has met a U.S president and countless numbers of government officials, and she has even designed the ornaments that hung from the Christmas trees at the White House. Yet, Susan Castriota makes no apologies for what her dogs mean to her. After all, one of them even helped save her life. That dog would be Bella, a Havanese whom she adopted to provide a four-legged friend to Kiki, who was her first Havanese. It was during the summer of 2012 that Bella appeared to nuzzle and sniff at one of Castriota’s breasts. As Bella persisted over a period of time, she grew concerned, and upon further research, learned that because of their sense of smell, dogs have been known to detect certain kinds of cancer. A regular mammogram confirmed what Bella had detected, and See next page 50 724.9