Category Archives: Diary of a Dog Walker

Follow along in the adventures of an Out-U-Go Dog Walker.

Dogs and Kids

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Jackson & Poncho

I think I’ve always liked dogs.  I can’t really remember interacting with them when I was a very little person, but that’s either because I just don’t remember, or because my parent’s kept me at more than a flailing arms-length, for my sake and the dog’s.  My family didn’t get a dog until I was in Kindergarden, and then I remember loving Morgan the Scottish Terrier intensely and delighting in pulling her around by that lovely natural handle called a tail.  I hated the thought of her liking anyone more than me, because how could such a thing be possible?  I drew 1000 faithful portraits of her, working many a black crayon into a candy nub.  I defended her great courage and intelligence to all my fellow Kindergardeners (lousy bunch of braggarts), and I even give her credit for landing me my first date, when after suggesting to the lovely Sheena that we get together some time and watch our dogs race, I got myself invited to her birthday party.  There were other kids at the party too and no dogs, but still, “hey, let’s get our dogs together and race ’em” is a pickup line that attracts only the choice few.

Nowadays I walk some dogs that could, and maybe would, devour poor Morgan.  She was feisty as a terrier and once ran off and killed someone’s chicken (“she killed Davie!”). But in retrospect, I’d say she had the patience of a saint.  Too bad for saints, they’re so often admirable only in retrospect.  But I’m reminded of her virtue every time Jackson, Poncho and I walk by the neighbor’s when the yard is just boiling with little kids.  They all yell out “Jackson!” and come bounding over.  As the larger handsomer dog, the kids look up to him more than Poncho, literally.  Poncho doesn’t seem to feel slighted, and in truth, he’s probably relieved not to be the center of that kind of attention.  The kids and the dogs often play in their respective yards separated only by a small chain-link fence, and for the kids, the presence of these large carnivores is only fun, fun, fun!  It’s Out-U-Go! policy not to let people pet the dogs you’re walking, but usually it’s all I can do to pull the dogs away from the kids (and I do, though the only real danger is some little Molly or Jesse getting lovingly bludgeoned by a wildly wagging tail).  The house on the other side has an even smaller child, and sometimes he waves from his perch on his mother’s hip as we stroll by their porch.  “Say, ‘hi doggies!'” says mom, and though the lil’ tyke hasn’t quite managed that yet, I have no doubt he will soon, and ‘hi doggies’ will become one of the first phrases he ever mutters.

Not all people like dogs, and not all dogs like kids.  I’m sure much of that has to do with experience, as in, people never exposed to dogs as kids (or to mean dogs only) are more likely to be cat people, and dogs accustomed to sheep and old folks might not be so thrilled by the less restrained, miniature iterations of our species.  But I walk by kids in strollers all the time, kids so small that they still interact with the world by grasping and grabbing at the images in front of them like a drunken caveman in his first 3D movie (what does that make them, one-year olds?  I’m bad at baby aging. They drool).  And lo and behold, these kids, fresh to the world and unburdened with experience to lend them bias, roll by me and my dog-of-the-moment with arms outstretched, ooing and cooing in a way that can only be translated as “hey, I like that thing there. Gimme”.  I admit it’s possible they are associating these dogs with the stuffed animals in their cribs (and with dogs like Sally or Bisou that’s a very forgivable mistake), but I prefer to think these little humans are expressing a canine affinity that has become so natural and easy in us over the 30,000 or so years of our species’ partnership that one could almost call it instinctual. That may not hold water scientifically, but just imagine sitting on a sofa next to a 400 pound Pug and not feeling a little afraid.  Imagine!  Powerful forces are at work.  Babies all over the world interact joyfully with large carnivores that they should naturally fear. As for the carnivores themselves, lets just say that Bella the German Shepard went from a sweet and goofy pup to full lock-down security guard the moment her owner’s brought their new baby from the hospital.  No one had to say “Bella, guard this little pink loaf with your life,” let alone “Bella, don’t eat it.”  No training required.  And if Bella’s half the saint my Morgan was, that little baby is going to grow up a dog lover, and raise little dog lovers of her own.  There will be generations of little hands pulling patient tails!  And that’s a warm a fuzzy thought for a rainy day.

 

Ghosts, continued…….

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Bailey, when she's not protecting John from ghosts!

Bailey is one of the happiest-go-luckiest dogs around. She delights in everything, and though she barks at other dogs, it is usually in a spirit of play.  But one day as we were both trotting along wagging as usual, she suddenly froze, turned every hair into a hackle and raised it, and began snarling and barking like I truly never imaged she could.  This was one very frightened and upset dog.  And there was nothing there.  I looked and looked in the trees or along the roof lines for anything unusual, but there was nothing, not even a squirrel.  Then whatever it was went away, and she looked at me and resumed her wagging, apparently quite pleased with herself for scaring off whatever it was she saw. Who knows, maybe she saved my life from legions of phantom trolls.  I don’t think so, but I didn’t want to risk being ungrateful, so I told her she was a good girl.

Bisou, Sally and Dudley have all behaved like this.  My reaction in each case is at first professional, as I look for some other dog or danger to avoid.  But then it’s instinctual. Before they were anything else, dogs were, for humans, an extension of our senses.  They smell what we can’t and tell us about it.  They listen while we sleep.  They sense the world and bark about it, and we ignore them at our peril.  And since we’re tuned into dogs like they’re tuned in to us, and they are also tuned to the invisible or impossible world (or not) then they are our furry points of access to that world.  Being extra-tuned to dogs is my avocation as well as my occupation.  So when a dog is as spooked as Bailey was, I get a little spooked too.  My hackles go up.  I tell her “hush girl, its okay”, but it comes out like a nervous question.  In the end the phantom trouble departs, and we go on our way, neither species able to comfort the other, but both still determined to try and face the world together.  And ghosts or no ghosts, this is itself a truly amazing and almost mystical connection.  At least usually.  Some dogs are harder to connect with, but this is simply because they aren’t really dogs, but aliens from a distant galaxy sent to infiltrate us.  Or perhaps they’re aliens enjoying one of the galaxies best retired lives. You can’t tell me they’re not.

 

Do you believe in ghosts?

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Josey

Ask someone this simple question and you’ll likely receive a complicated answer: Do you believe in ghosts?

You might hear “well I don’t know but I had this friend…” or “you certainly have to keep an open mind” or “we humans really understand so little about the universe” or “I grew up watching Ghostbusters so…”

At least you’d hear that from me.  I think if there were spirits and echoes and djin floating through time and between realms and amongst us all the time, they wouldn’t much care whether or not I believed in them. Although maybe spooks and spirits are just like Peter Pan or Santa Clause or Polar Bears in that our very belief in them keeps them flying. Pugs and Bulldogs are kinda like that too – just a decade of human indifference (i.e. no more caesarean born puppies) and they’d pretty well just disappear. Still, I gain nothing by declaring that I think it’s all pathetic simple-minded hogwash, which is how I would declare it if I ever had an experience that led me to reject the possibility of the impossible.  I don’t know what such an experience could be, and I’m not sure I want to. Besides, it’s more fun to talk about the opposite kind of experience. An “encounter” if you will.

Oak Park is an old town with a lot of history.  I walk dogs around a couple of big cemeteries that are full of almost two centuries worth of the former forms that carried lives, loves, passions, dreams, and even whole worlds.  I walk with Sally by a castle of a house, complete with gargoyles and turrets, which has a plaque out front stating, “On This Site in 1887–Nothing Happened”.  Oh, but what about in 1886, when a runaway horse cart killed a child and set off generations of feuding and tore the town in two?  Or 1973, when at a celebration for the end of Prohibition, a young couple snuck off for a kiss (not noticing the plaque or anything else) , a kiss that would lead to a home full of children who will themselves travel the world and pull with them a cosmic spider’s silk forever connected to that spot?  Or in 1354 BC, when a man with a spear killed a really big bear all by himself and was just so happy that his dancing created a metaphysical sinkhole on precisely that spot?  I dunno.  The point is, Oak Park is as psychically-charged as anywhere, except maybe that hotel in ‘The Shining’.

People might tell you all of that.  But if you ask the dogs I walk if they believe in ghosts, they’d say “arf”, meaning, “heck yeah man I seen ’em”.  It’s widely reported that dogs can predict earthquakes, detect cancers, find their way to loved ones across thousands of miles, and look cute all the while.  Cats get all the credit for being ethereal (or just plain spooky–look up Oscar the Grim Reaper), but dogs have mystical goods too, and in my opinion, are way less up-tight about it.  Do all animals have these gifts?  Do we humans have them too? Lost and forgotten in the clutter of our own modern minds?  Has intelligence replaced intuition?  Are dogs in possession of or possessed by their preternatural abilities? Is this a cause, or an effect, of their sleeping 18 hours a day?

Now I’ll grant that Josey is a little unique to begin with. I won’t go into the details, but one of her more singular idiosyncrasies is the urge to constantly look over her shoulder as we walk, as if we’re being followed.  Sometimes, exasperated after towing her for several blocks without her even looking where we’re going (look a fire hydrant! hey some mud! for goodness sake your missing everything and it’s for your sake we’re doing this, come on!) I’ll indulge her in a little break so that she can sit and have a good long look behind us and finally satisfy herself that there is nothing back there. She’ll stare, then look at me, then back again, then be ready to go, only to peer back again after a few steps. Now maybe there’s a speck in her cornea which makes her see spots.  Maybe the bright light dazzles her after hours in a dark house.  Maybe Josey is just being weird, true to her m.o. Or maybe, all the while, she is staring dead into the dead black eyes of a mailman who is floating behind us; eyes that shimmer with eternal malice for all dogs, ever since he died of a rabid bite over 80 years ago.  He cannot avenge himself physically, which is why he follows us and makes me haul poor Josey around.  I’m sorry already.

But it gets weirder.  To be continued………

 

 

Mattie’s Poop

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Mattie the Boxer

Mattie is a gorgeous little reddish Boxer who walks like no other dog.  She hardly sniffs a thing, and only wants to go forward, fast, and now.  She could not attract more admiring attention if she were a fine colorful Victorian lady gliding down the street under a parasol, and like such a lady, she is most particular about where she evacuates.  It is important that Mattie goes because if she comes home still loaded, she has to be crated instead of free run of the home.  Even if it takes extra-long and we have to walk all the way to Indiana, I am resolved to not be satisfied until she is.

This is why it’s always very exciting when the great moment arrives.  You can tell it’s impending when she lowers her head to actually consider the ground as we walk.  Then as we approach the drop zone, she begins to swing her body back and forth in ever-tighter turns, just like a fish swimming up stream, if that fish were also a belly dancer playing hopscotch.  I stand back and enjoy the show, trying not to laugh (any disturbance could be fatal to the endeavor) as her turns get tighter and tighter and quicker and quicker until she is not actually moving around but rather just flailing like a possessed and very negative head-banging rock star.  Then comes the squat, which is more like a self-defense pose than anything, and then Mattie sheds about a quarter of her body weight.  But that’s not the best part.  The apex of this little ritual, the part that had me laughing like a mad man in the street the first time I saw it, is what she does with her legs. After all that twisting and dancing, all that kinetic energy needs somewhere to go, and so it shoots through her legs and discharges into the earth like lighting, as her hind legs thump up and down like the happiest of cartoon rabbits.  Then, lighter and leaner, she’s off again.

I feel privileged to witness this.  It’s what zoo keepers must feel like when baby Pandas are born.  Mattie’s creation is oh-so-much less cute than a baby Panda, but nonetheless receives prompt attention.  And this is the real advantage of having what is by now a preternatural ability to tell when a dog is getting ready to do his duty.  Before the pooch can begin kicking up earth, I have their rejected kibble bagged, tied and ready to toss. Dogs can somehow predict earthquakes, but I too can spot the tiniest shift indicating impending seismic movement in the seismometers themselves.  The 4th lumbar vertebra lifts about a half millimeter, the sniffing becomes 4-12% more assiduous, the path straightens out and The Poop Walk begins.  By this time, I’ve already got a bag open and ready.  A pair of figure skaters could not pick up each other’s poop with more speed and grace.

But there is a darker side to this ability?  The fact that I’m so proud of it is itself quite worrying.  Is the price I pay for my new talent…my sanity?   Could laughing like a madman as Mattie does her poop dance mean that I’m actually a madman? Is it wrong to be so emotionally invested in a dog’s baser functions?  There are little alarm bells in my head that chime even as I strut down the street chirping “Good Mattie!  Such a good little pooper!  And such a nice big poop!”  I’m afraid I’m over the hill.  Or the mound, as it were.  But I am a professional dammit, and no one can convince me that Mattie is not a good girl.  Dogs have such little responsibility, you can’t deny them their little glories.  I won’t be the parent that reproaches his 3rd grader for messing up his lines in the school play.  Yes it’s poop, and yes I’m losing it, but way to go Mattie.  I’m proud of you.

 

Poop

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We shall not name this poo's maker

In a way, dog walkers are like miners – we take substances which are locked up deep inside some cave and remove it to a more agreeable location.  We are also like stock brokers – we seek the most auspicious situation from which to profit from anticipated developments.  Also we are like outfielders – the moment some bolus hits the grass, we try to snatch it up and throw it out. Substances, developments, bolus – all fancy words for poop.

Dogs will always pee on things.  A dry dog in a dessert will still lift his leg at a cactus, even if he doesn’t have a drop to spare.  Some dogs create great lakes in their living rooms on a regular basis (I’m calling you out, Dudley) while others would never dream of committing so heinous an impropriety.  Some dogs mark every tree as if they were straddling a spray can, while others go only once, and only when there’s no one around. It’s really quite intricate, but even so, #1 is only half as vexing as #2.

I always feel a little bad if a walk is not fruitful, so to speak.  It’s a little embarrassing to have to write “1 only” under the “I was a good dog and went number” line on the Doggie Diary.  Of course, I can’t make a dog poop, even if I have at times wondered if there isn’t some kung-fu move that I could deploy that would (harmlessly) hit some pressure points to align the dogs chi, and thus his bowels.  Some dogs observe a regular daily schedule that is simply out of sync with my own walking schedule.  Other dogs get too busy smelling things, or staring at squirrels, or skipping around like caffeinated crickets.  Some dogs get blocked up with diets of stuffed animals and socks, while others require a crossword and a quite corner of their own back yard.  I do what I can to encourage their every success, but ultimately, it’s a battle they each must fight alone.

And what a fight it is sometimes. To be continued……

 

 

 

A Dog’s View of the Civil War

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Today (April 12, 2011) is the 150th Anniversary of the attack on Fort Sumpter and the start of the American Civil War.  Most of the dogs I walk are history buffs, and I won’t be a bit surprised to find them waiting for me with capes and long goatees and muskets, or in hoop skirts and bonnets; whatever their inclination.  We won’t walk so much as march or promenade, and instead of picking up the poop I’ll just leave it all like little brown flags to declare our conquered territory.  I’d rather not stage any battles though, just for the sake of time.  Some of the multi-dog homes I visit already have regular reenactments, albeit with certain creative canine twists such as the biting of ears instead of the firing of muskets, and mutual leg gnawing in the place of cavalry charges.  This is to be discouraged, anniversary or no.  Though playing dead is always fine, especially since it’s a trick that human Civil War re-enactors are notoriously reluctant to perform.

It’s actually interesting to look at the Civil War through a dog’s eyes.  Dogs are the embodiment of that kind of unquestioned loyalty which we humans alternately admire and lament, depending on whether we encounter it in forces for or against us.  Forces like armies.  You could no more convince Hachiko, the Akita that waited for 9 years (until his death) for his dead master to arrive at the Tokyo train station, to give it a rest and go play fetch or something, than you could have convinced the Army of Northern Virginia to stop fighting in 1862 and just let the Yankees roll through Dixie.  Though if you could have done the latter, you would have saved this country a lot of trouble.  So thanks for nothing.

Someone who strives for something against all odds and good sense is exhibiting a kind of determination we call ‘dogged.’ With dogs, the great tidal force that pulls them (other than pure hedonism) is loyalty.  It motivates them to sit and wag and bark at noises in the night, just as it motivated Robert E. Lee to refuse Lincoln’s offer of command of the entire Union army, and become the leader of his state’s militia instead.  Lee didn’t support succession and didn’t much care for slavery, but his loyalties were fixed for him from his Southern birth, as was his aristocratic sense of honor, which in turn bound him to his loyalties so firmly that he doggedly fought for what he likely knew to be a lost cause.  He even kind of looked like a Bearded Sheep Dog.

My mom lives with a Black Lab and a German Shorthaired Pointer.  They’re my dogs in other words, though I left home and they didn’t.  She said once that it’s funny to think that, had they been raised by different people, they would love them as much as they now love her.  I was offended by this on the dog’s behalf.  They are our dogs and could never be happy with anyone else.  Even if we never met them, they would sit and heave great sad doggy sighs and long for something they couldn’t quite imagine (my family and I), just as we would pine away, vaguely missing something we never had.  At least that’s what I like to think.  In reality my mom is probably right:  their doggy love and loyalty is totally circumstantial, and completely non-transferable.  This doesn’t cheapen a dog’s loyalty, but on the contrary makes it all the more miraculous:  they don’t judge, they don’t hold out for something better, and they would never dream of seceding from any family. This is what makes abuse of dogs so horrible, because it is exclusively one-sided.  The dogs are doing the best they can in every case, and any mistreatment is a cruel betrayal of some of the most pristine, crystalline loyalties in the world.

My mom jokes that though the dogs make big noise when anyone approaches the house (including the mail carrier), they are too nice to really be very protective.  Though they make her feel a little safer when home alone, she says, it would really only take a burglar armed with a couple dog treats to totally deactivate the furry security system.  I totally disagree.  I know they are both very sweet and loving dogs, but I’m also sure that either one would lay down their life to protect her.  Even if General Sherman were marching through the living room, they would unthinkingly form a firing-line behind the sofa to guard their human’s flank.  If the German Shorthair did (or could–he’s not very bright) stop to think about it, he might reconsider.  But he never would.  We humans do enough philosophizing, prevaricating and rationalizing for all the animals in the world.  Dogs are great because they aren’t mixed up by any of that.  They’re just dogged.

Dogs and Their Nicknames

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Beau aka "allez Beau Geste"

I walk dogs with some great names.  Barley. Dudley. Poncho. Homer. Beau. Etcetera. Not only are they fun to say, but every one of those dogs fits his or her name perfectly. Either every owner was inspired by a bolt of lightning from heaven, or the dogs have so finely tuned their canine empathy with humans that they intuitively understand every historic or poetic reference contained within their names and divine the appropriate emotive response from the way we pronounce every syllable.  Like Mozart staring at a refrigerator covered with little magnet quarter notes, the dogs pull meaning from chaos and transform a sound into something natural and irrefutable. They are brilliant linguists and don’t even know it.

Other names I like to create nicknames for so I feel like I’m talking to the right dog.  Buddi. Sally. Jackson. Annie. Biscuit. Tsuki. The pooches do their best with what they’ve been given, but Orecchio is simply too big a handle for a small dog; “Rekyo” fits better.  Biscuit usually needs an adjective (Soggy, Crazy, Quick, Anything).  Tsuki becomes a verb (to Tsuk:  writhe around in snow or grass–or a rug if no snow is available–and snort and wag and generally look like the happiest thing that every lived).  Sally becomes “Fräulein” (just cause).  Dudley’s name fits great, but still he has been awarded some other titles, such as Mister, Captain, or Doctor.  Beau is a Standard Poodle and naturally speaks French, so he comes to “allez Beau Geste!”  Tucker is jolly, celibate (neutered) and a bit of a rascal, so I have no choice but to call him Friar Tuck.

Bailey is thrilled by everything so much so that her name replaces every word in my vocabulary while we’re together.  Sit, come, look a squirrel, here’s a treat: it all comes out as “Bay Bay!”  When I walk in the door and find her wagging with a toy in her mouth, I declare “it’s a Baaaaaayleeee” because simply commenting on her existence seems to bring her great joy. Though she doesn’t strike me as a creature much hung up on existentialism, who doesn’t like their presence confirmed now and then?  If a Bailey wags in the forest and no one is around, is it still really cute?  I assure her that she is.

I’m especially fond of the two-dog names.  “Jackson and Poncho” has become “JacksonPonch”, just as Morgan and Barley have morphed into MorganBarley.  That is to say, they’re not just becoming easier on the tongue, but also forming a new super-organism superhero.  Like a little wolf-pack or a bee hive of two, they are different parts of the same animal, each joined by a syllable to invoke a great magical beast strong enough to guard the gates of hell.  I know this is true because when I walk in and shout “Morganbarley!” I am greeted equally by both parts of the superdog.  If I say “good dog”, both tails begin to wag though it is clear to everyone that I did not say “dogs” plural.  The wagging and bunny-hopping Jacksonponcho both respond to their name by saying “Yes, it is I, and so is Us! Take me both for a walk!” It’s wild.

Though dogs are brilliant linguists, able to see right through all the clutter of grammar and syntax and divine the true meaning of what’s said to them by it’s tone and volume, I’m a little concerned that they might take this too far.  What if they forget the the name etched on their collars?  What if, for example, Jackson Poncho becomes so convinced of his/their new identity and so eager to embrace the life that correlates to the way I pronounce his/their name that he/they actually leave home one day to become heroic airship pirates?  What if Morgan Barley actually goes to London and becomes a prominent barrister?  I’d have alot of explaining to do to their owners.  But it’s not really my fault (I’d say) because, well, it came to me in a bolt of lightening.

 

Dog Walkers – Part Ninja, Part Viking, Part Teacher

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Before I describe my epic struggle to be accepted by the wild roaming pack of Bulldogs, I would like to make a couple of observations about the dog-walking business from my 3 or so months on the job.

Dog walkers are kind of like ninjas.  Quickly and confidently, we enter people’s homes and efficiently carry out our missions, disappearing suddenly into a cloud of smoke.  Actually we’re not like ninjas.  But we are like Vikings.  We come in the morning mist and our fervid throaty yells proclaim to our victims that we come to claim all that we do not destroy and bring it back to Norway and okay I guess were not like Vikings either.  Let’s suppose we’re like teachers.  We take care of your little ones for a while and then we give you a report card mostly just confirming what you already know and love about them, having ourselves no mandate to controvert or supplant you or your style of pet parenting. The little ones may love us intensely, but at the end of the day we are just the minor supporting cast in the furry one’s life.  A supporting cast of Viking, ninja, teachers are we.  And not dog trainers.

If I see a dog everyday and have never met their owner and have no notion of how the owner interacts with the dog (cuddly gushing indulgent, strict disciplinarian, laissez fair individualists, etc), I have to sort of go with it.  Of course there are often lots of great Out-U-Go! and parent notes available, but where info is not explicit, there are always clues.  If a dog walks always on the right, then that is probably how he or she has been raised.  I have no business meddling and confusing things, even if every other dog I see that day walks strictly on the left.  Dogs are creatures of tremendous adaptability, but the other side of that coin is a powerful tendency to habituate to the patterns and rhythms of their home environment.  Strange and unconventional though these may be; it’s not for me to judge.

Jackson and Poncho, for example, are two large dogs that almost always walk the exact same route.  I know that route because if I try to take another one, Jackson the Great Dane mix will stare at me with what looks like canine horror and then pull and pull until we’re back on track.  Magglio and MJ are used to having their treats tossed to them, which is the only way I think their owners can continue to have hands, since I nearly lost mine the first time I met them.  Dudley is used to getting a treat right after his walk, and if I delay there will be a small lake of drool for me to clean up.  I enter and conform to a hundred such customs every day, like a mad anthropologist with a combination teleporter/espresso maker.  At every visit, the dogs reveal the boundaries and engrained behaviors that best join them with their owner’s happiness.  Like ninjas, our hand is best invisible.  Like Vikings, we do not come to teach or preach.  Like teachers, we can always gather together at recess and share some good natured eye-rolling, and then bite our tongues and go back to the little ones that we care for.

Yet dog walkers must have boundaries too.  Not being bitten is always nice, but I’m talking about subtler stuff.  For example, whether or not a dog is used to stopping and sitting at intersections when walking with his owner, the pooch is going to at least stop when we have to cross a street where there are cars, and wait for me to determine the best time to cross.  Not negotiable, sorry pup.  Likewise is no dog allowed to stop in the middle of a street to smell something or have a good scratch.  I’m sure that’s really important business on the dogs agenda (probably the only business on the agenda in fact) but as a human with a car, I understand the risk of other humans with cars, and thus I’m really better qualified to take charge at that moment.

Sally is not allowed to chew on the neighbor’s Chihuahua no matter how much she wants to.  Homer is not allowed to eat snow that gives him bladder infections.  Abigale is not allowed to roll her nice fluffy white coat in the mud.  Morgan and Barley aren’t allowed to try and climb me like mountaineers, since they always either scratch my face, rip my clothes, or kick me in the groin.  Tsuki isn’t allowed to sniff the same spot for more than 30 seconds, because it’s a 20 minute visit, we’ve got to walk at least 100 feet to the corner, and I know for a fact that there is another equally thrilling smell just two feet ahead.  Give a ninja a break.

Morgan & Barley - Mountaineers!

Dudley - treats first, or sop up the drool!

And Buddi, oh Buddi.  Buddi is not allowed to destroy his leash.  He is not allowed to take up half of every visit chomping on to his choke chain (I conform to the equipment too) and clinging to it like it was all that he had ever loved, or truly hated.  Either way,  it’s my job to walk you, and I’m gonna.  I never set out to teach Buddi that tug-of-war was bad, cause he must do a lot of it with his owner.  Might as well tell a bird to quit all that fooling around the sky and get to marching.

But tug-of-war with your leash every day before I can even get it on you, that means no time for walking, for him or his brother, Orecchio.  It has to stop, and I have no time to correct behavior.  The clock is ticking, so I go against my better dog-raising instinct and accept the declaration of (tug-of) war.  For a person who is trying to fit comfortably into a new social hierarchy while maintaining at least nominal delegated authority, tug-of-war is risky.  You don’t want to encourage fighting, you don’t want to be seen as on the dog’s level, and most of all, you do not want to lose.  This last maxim was echoing in my head as I tried to remove the collar from the mouth of the truculent 50-pound lock-jawed beast that was bred to bring down bulls.  In total darkness.  That story next time.

 

Bulldogs – a unique perspective on “cute”

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Every time I walk Buddi and Orecchio, it seems people just have to tell me how cute they are and “oh isn’t he precious what kind is he” and “where can I get one.”  My own first reaction was quite different.  When I first met Buddi and Orecchio, I was as shy as a new kid in class.  I’d never had any interaction with Bulldogs before, so, though I consider myself a dog person, I admit I was at a loss for what to make of the little critters.  My definition of “dog” had always assumed, among other things, an animal with a tail and nose and ears.  I’ll admit they’re charming, and I don’t mean to hurt their feelings when today I walk into the room and say “hello monsters!”  The boys seem to relish their strangeness, and I guess you could say they wear it well.  Bulldogs certainly have their fan base, kind of like, say, Danzig, and I don’t want to antagonize them. Or Danzig for that matter.  Rock on, sir.

Still, there’s no getting around the fact that Buddi looks like he came from the kennel of Dr. Frankenstein, who, undertaking canine design as a side project not worthy of his full attention, was content to just use whatever parts were laying around.  In Orecchio’s case it seems that mad Doctor F simply crossed a bat with a large potato.  Snouts and tails must have been in very short supply, because both their faces look like they’re trying to sneak back into their heads and hide, and though Orecchio has a little nub tail, Buddi has nothing but a smooth streamlined rump.  He’d probably be very aerodynamic if he ever got over 4 mph, and was heading backwards. But they’re great, I mean, “yay Bulldogs!”

Actually Buddi was sired by a champion show dog.  So though he may not have been Frankenstein’s creation, someone did indeed try very hard to bring life to that peculiar form.  Bulldogs were not bred to hunt or track or work or herd (ha!).  They were originally bred to fight bulls.  Since bull-baiting has declined in popularity in the past few centuries, poor Buddi has all the fearlessness and gall to take on a bull but alas, there are no bulls to be found (at least on our walks in Forest Park, IL).  So Buddi improvises by latching on to just about anything else, including sticks, bushes, Orecchio, my shoe, and most of all, the leash I walk him with.

He looks very inert.  Of the dozens of colorful adjectives that slap my cortex upon viewing Buddi, one of the most pragmatic is “inert.”  “Solid” is another one, and indeed I challenge any lump of lead to pack as much weight into that same size.  Yet Buddi is capable of amazing leaps.  From a calm seated position with no wind-up or viper’s coil, he can launch himself at something in the blink of an eye.  He is simply a mass located in a particular place one moment, and the very next moment he is in another particular place–likely a place you don’t want him to be–and is firmly anchored to that place with a lock jaw that is, along with his leaping/teleportation ability, explicable only in terms of mutant X-man powers.

These powers, and my efforts to match them against my own dog walking powers, I’ll have to tell you about later.  Or watch the movie ‘X Men’ and you’ll get some idea.

 

The Bulldog Pack

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Buddi is an English Bulldog.

Buddi

Buddi the English Bulldog

Orecchio is a French Bulldog.

 

Orecchio

Orecchio the Bulldog

Sometimes the two of them like to re-enact the 100 Years War, and it’s times like that which make me grateful that Bulldogs’ canine teeth are recessed into their tiny snouts, or else it would be too true a re-enactment, with blood and carnage spread out across the globe.  Instead, they just sort of wrestle each other and snarl and try to bite but usually after a few moments of furry fury get so exhausted that they just retreat to opposite corners of the room and vomit.  You can ask a historian how well this performance symbolizes the 100 Years War.  All I know is I don’t like watching it, yet dare not venture a hand to pull them apart, lest it be returned to me a stump.  Also, if I pull one away and restrain him, the other seizes the opportunity to get some cheap shots.  No one is ever really hurt and there isn’t always a clear winner, so I bite my lip and let them fight it out.  At least, I used to. They haven’t fought in weeks.  It might have something to do with hormone changes in Buddi, who was neutered several month ago.  Possible.  But I’d rather take the credit for fostering a comfortable environment where neither dogs feels the need to vie for position in the pack.  It hasn’t been easy, but slowly, they are turning into teddy bears.

Buddi is about 50 lbs and very powerful.  He is also, to quote his human dad, “a huge butthead.”  He is aware of how strong and intimidating he is, and likes to push boundaries.  Orecchio, like many younger siblings, is much more mellow.  When Buddi is acting up by, say, attacking the towel you are using to wipe up wet paw prints, or trying to pick and then win a fight with a nearby hockey stick, Orecchio will sometimes reproach his brother by attacking him.  This is very noble and brave of Orecchio (fine Renaissance gentleman that he is) since Buddi is at least twice his size.  These fights end quickly because Buddi knows he is in the wrong, and like any older sibling who has just been tattled on, he contests the point just a little for decorum’s sake, and then sulks away to plot his revenge.

But the revenge motive is only part of the explanation for their fights.  The greater part has to do with pack dynamics, and the complications that come along with new pack members.  Since I walk Buddi and Orecchio (or Rec as I like to call him) twice a day, I am kind of part of the pack.  The bulldogs are like any dogs in that they instinctively seek the comfort of knowing who is the pack leader.  That can never be me, nor should it be.  If their owner was a petite woman, the boy’s would defer to her like the wonderful and loyal vassals that dogs so often are.  But their human is in fact himself a large and powerful guy, and so the thing I’ll call a mind residing inside Buddi’s “butthead” has an extra overt and satisfying bit of information to put his pack sense to rest:  the knowledge that his owner could kick his butt.  Not that his owner would, because he is in fact a very doting and caring pet parent.  But with Buddi, I just get the sense there is more of a high-school gym-room kind of mentality.  Before I showed up, the pack was clear in his mind:  big monkey thing (his owner) on top, then himself (the Awesome One), then the Frenchman.  Simple.

Then I showed up…

To be continued