"My Dog Has A Job?" — Guest Post by Lynne Hinkey (@LMHinkey)

Lynne Hinkey is a marine scientist by training, a writer by passion, and a curmudgeon by nature. An Olympic-caliber procrastinator, she honed her skill through years of practice and dedication to life on island-time. She uses her experiences living in the Caribbean to infuse her novels with tropical magic, from the siren call of the islands to the terror and hysteria caused by the mysterious chupacabra. 

P.S. from Guilie: And she *loves* dogs.

The Divide Between Animals & Humankind (or: Where Myth Meets Truth) — Guest Post by Ann Bennett

Ann Bennett is out to give science a good (and fun!) name at Science Ladybug. At So Much To Choose From, she blogs about writing, her thoughts & experiences, and so much more. Welcome, Ann!

Sometimes, late in the evening, I can hear my father’s voice. Playfully he spoke in rhymes and shared beloved stories. The ones I loved best were stories from his memory which had been passed down through generations.

This is one of my favorites.

The Story of Little Leo (and How He Adopted Us) — Guest Post by Susan Brody @unpubYA

It all started when cancer took our beloved Murphy from us in February. He wasn't quite 11 years old.

Murphy & me

We'd had three months of warning that this was coming. In November, he had collapsed. I was the only one home. I scooped him up and drove like a lunatic to the vet. The vet did a sonogram and showed me the unmistakable outline of the large tumor on his spleen. He could probably save him this time, the vet told me, but it would only be a matter of weeks or months until the tumor ruptured and no one would be able to save him. Every day from here on in would be a gift.

The vet did save him that time, and then performed the same miracle once again in December. But in January Murphy began steadily losing weight and becoming weaker, despite his six daily medications. When he collapsed again on February 6th, we knew it was the end. Despite all the time we'd had to prepare, once he was gone no one in my family could imagine what we would do without him.

But we still had another dog at home that we had to take care of: 8-year-old Finney, our younger Goldendoodle, who from the age of 8 weeks had never known life without Murphy. And, unlike us, he didn't understand what had happened.

Finney (left) and Murphy

A-Z of #Dog Rescue: New Kid In The Pack — #AtoZChallenge

Because of that space challenge we were talking about yesterday (over-capacity shelters, too few foster homes), rescuers all too often end up bringing a dog home. If you have no dogs, great; but what if, like most of us, you already have a houseful? Will they be okay with this new (temporary, or pseudo-temporary) member of the family?

A-Z of #Dog Rescue: Catch Me (If You Can) — #AtoZChallenge

A fellow A2Z-er made the perfect comment on Saturday's post to introduce this one:

Mark Twain wrote: "No good deed goes unpunished." We must prepare for the bruises and wounds that come with helping the helpless. :-(

Thank you, Roland. (Hop on over when you get a chance and show him some love!) He's 100% right, you know. Sometimes rescue gets rough. Sometimes a dog that needs immediate help refuses to cooperate. For whatever reason—and variations are endless. But it comes down to this:

 How do you catch a dog that doesn’t want to be caught? 

A-Z of #Dog Rescue: Assessment — #atozchallenge

Every situation—every dog—is different. No two rescues are the same. That’s why assessment is so very, very important before you jump in.

But assess what, exactly? And how?

Agility (and Animal Welfare Awareness) Day @ Wilhelminaplein!

I won't try to catch up all at once with everything that's happened in the last — whoa, 11 months! (Has it really been—? Yes... yes, it has. And I'm sorry for that. I love this blog.) I'll start with last weekend and — maybe, slowly — work my way back to some highlights.

So. This past weekend.

I-Animal (an animal welfare organization here in Curaçao) had its yearly Animal Day celebration at Wilhelminaplein — an open space, kind of like a city square, in Punda (downtown Willemstad) — and we were invited to join the agility run hosted by Yuka's Hondentraining. It was free of charge, geared to demonstrate the potential any dog, regardless of breed or previous training, has for conquering the agility course — and the fun they have while doing it.

More importantly, I think, it's a great way to prove Cesar Millán's point about training humans (and rehabilitating dogs). Any sort of "dog" training is, at its core, a way to establish (or, ideally, deepen) the bond between human and dog — and the agility run is a fantastic way to demonstrate it.

Out of the seven-pack, I chose to come with Duncan... For several reasons, which I can get into at length for another post, but in short: he's not the best-behaved (so the training would benefit him and me) but not the worst, either (so I could feasibly be setting him up for success); he's also really food-oriented (unlike, for instance, Sam), which makes everyone's life easier. But, mostly, I chose Duncan because we have a bond. A good, strong, special bond.

Bond which would be put to the test.

Yes, we're still alive... #WOOFSupport Report

Things were hectic during April down here. The A-to-Z Challenge, other writing projects, household stuff; my computer broke down at the end of March, which did not help. All in all, I devoted little (read: zero) time to proper training.

As with everything else Dog, it's the human that's to blame.

But I'm (slowly) learning from my four-legged teachers. No would've, could've, should've. Move forward. It's about the present; yesterday's gone, tomorrow doesn't exist yet.

I'm trying.

So. First: what are we struggling with? Besides general reactivity (which, as I've mentioned, spreads like wildfire in a pack--and I still can't figure out why it's the reactivity, and not the calm, that spreads), our neighbor at the back has two new dogs. Puppies. One around 6 months, the other about 10 or 12 weeks.

And my dogs do not like them.

Which means there's loud, incessant, and obsessive barking at the fence. It just takes one to start--one of mine, I mean--and the other six sprint like stampeding Mustangs to join in the call to defend the fortress. The neighbor's dogs think it's great fun. They're puppies; of course they think it's fun.

But it's mighty serious business for my pack.

It doesn't last very long; even without (my) interference, they're done--tired, hoarse, bored--after about seven minutes. But with nine dogs barking as loud as they can, those seven minutes feel endless.

The neighbors--the other neighbors, not the owners of the puppies--have begun to complain. We've had the police here twice, plus a "formal" protest visit to tell us to either shut the dogs up or else. (I'm paraphrasing.)

That's the latest symptom. The solution comes in short- and long-term; long-term, obviously, is what we're aiming for--I want all my dogs to be happy, able to deal calmly with the stress of encountering new things, to (dare I say it?) enjoy encountering new things. But long-term takes, well, longer. Given the neighbor issues, it's become a choice between my dogs' psychological and physical well-being (dog poisoning is disgustingly common in this island).

Short-term solution: I'm building a wooden fence at the back. (It's actually a relocation of the fence; if you're curious you can read more here.) That will prevent the dogs from having a clear view of the neighbor's yard, which will (we hope) stop, or at least diminish, the barking. That fence is going up this week if it kills me.

Then there's the long-term. The two trainers I consulted agreed that the reactivity in my pack comes from lack of exposure to new things. The three puppies (now 18 months old) were born in this house, never left, and--to top it off--when they were scheduled for puppy training, there was an outbreak of distemper in the island, which means we kept them in quarantine-like isolation: no visitors, no walks, no leaving the house at all. Whenever I went out to help with other dogs, I wore plastic bags on my shoes, changed clothes, and disinfected everything, including myself, before coming even close to the dogs back home. It was a crucial time in their development, those couple of months, and it didn't help that their mother also stayed with them for eight months. Or that they've grown up in a pack with another four dogs.

So anti-reactivity treatment in this house, besides general "obedience" (which, to me, isn't so much tricks or cute behavior but rather the establishment of a two-way language so that the dog and I may communicate effectively), includes one-on-one walks. And that's how we discovered the Kabouterbos.

The Kabouterbos--or "Dwarf Forest"

It's a mini-forest ("kabouter" means dwarf, "bos" means forest) nearby; not a park in any civilized sense of the word, just a few square kilometers of wilderness with paths created (and maintained) by the few people that go there, mostly with horses. And no, I don't go at the same time as they do; as curious as I am about what my dogs would do if they saw a horse, I think we're not ready for that particular experiment yet.

It takes me about ten minutes to walk to the Kabouterbos. Once away from the street, whoever the lucky dog of the day is (I have seven dogs, there's seven days in a week--it can't be an accident) can go off-leash.

I was surprised to see how well-behaved they become when it's just me and no other dogs. When we're all at the beach, even if it's just three or four dogs, they go much farther afield and the intervals between coming back to check on me are longer. Makes sense; they feel safer in a pack than they do alone. When there's other dogs, I'm part of the pack (pack leader or not). When it's just me, I am their pack.

This iguana, for example, barely escaped with its life.

That's not to say they hang out by my legs all the time. No, they wander--just not far. They chase lizards and iguanas, they catch interesting scents and stay back to sniff or follow them into the brush for a bit--then they realize they're all alone and dash back out to look for me.

I expected this, the bit about losing me, to send them into outright panic mode. Lo and behold--no. Even Sam, who's the most reactive of my dogs (I can't even go pee without him), exhibited no signs of hysteria when I disappeared (from his sight; I never let him out of mine). He backtracked a bit, found my scent, and trotted--trotted, not sprinted--nose-to-ground, in my direction. It took him a couple of tries, because I fought my every instinct and stayed motionless behind a tree, but even when he lost the scent and had to backtrack again, he seemed cool and collected. When he found me I was the one celebrating like crazy; he was all like, "Oh, there you are. Keep up, will you?"

Sam, startlingly calm all by his lonesome
at the Kabouterbos

So it works. Yes, I'm slightly surprised it does. Maybe because the results are so immediate. I guess I expected a lot more tension and stress, a lot more unpredictability.

Which, of course, says a lot more about me than about my pack--and explains a heck of a lot about their behavior.

~ * ~

Thanks for visiting, and please do hop over to the other participants in this month's WOOF Support blog hop--awesome bloggers and all-around great human beings.

Youth vs. Age (#atozchallenge)

After yesterday's post, you probably think I'm partial to puppies. Who wouldn't be? Little bundles of cuteness overload, a pristine mind, character yet unshaped. Puppies--like the bunnies and chicks that symbolize Easter--offer a fresh start. A blank page. Holding a puppy in your arms is like holding the future. And our dreams for it.

It's no surprise that puppies get adopted a lot faster than adult dogs. Which presents a problem for rescue organizations.

Two, actually.

The first, most obvious, is that adult dogs have ever-narrowing chances of finding a good home. By "adult" I don't mean "senior"--even one- or two-year-old dogs get passed over for puppies. And every time that happens is another nail in their coffins. (If only they had coffins.)

The second problem is, actually, the core problem of dog rescuing. Where do all these homeless dogs come from? Sure, a lot are born homeless (especially in third-world locations like the Caribbean and Latin America)--but not all of them. A huge number started out life in homes, in families--a family that wanted that "bundle of cuteness overload", that "fresh start". But puppies don't stay puppies forever. They grow. Oh, so very, very fast.

Raising a puppy is every bit as challenging as raising a child. With one significant difference: you've got around six to eight years, depending on the branch of child psychology you prefer, to form that child's foundation of values and principles. With a puppy, you've got months. And not that many.

I get it; all you want to do with a puppy is cuddle and take pictures. What do you do when you find him cutting his tiny baby teeth on your Gucci loafers? You go Awwww, snap a photo, post it on Facebook, and all your friends go Awwwww too. And how can you possibly leave that itty-bitty baby in a crate all night? No, no; he sleeps in the bed with us. Plenty of time to teach him later.

Too many people fall in love with the baby cuteness and forget its days are numbered--until, one day, the puppy is no longer a puppy, it's a grown dog that growls at you when you try to get him off the bed. Off goes the ex-puppy to the shelter (or the street).

Raising a puppy to be a calm, independent, happy adult--the companion of your dreams--is hard work.

An adult dog comes with challenges, too, but they're of a different nature. They're already there, immediately visible so you can decide whether you can or cannot deal with them.

An adult's basic character traits--full of energy or mellow, social or not, a cuddler or a loner--have already been established and (unless you're into rehabilitation, which is a whole different ballgame), won't change.

An adult is much easier to train; they've lived enough to know, for example, that going potty in the same place where you sleep or eat is a bad idea. They test boundaries less. They love with less distraction, less challenge.

And yet ninety percent of people will stride past the adult cages at a shelter without so much as a second glance.

Why is it that we value youth so much more? Not just a dog's--ours, too. The golden years were in our teens, our twenties. Growing old seems like the end of everything, a tragedy that most people go to extreme lengths to postpone--as if it could be. Lying about their age; using all sorts of creams, make-up, concealers, magic potions. Studying pop culture to be in with the newest slang, the latest fashions, the hippest music. Going under the knife.

Why? Why is the passing of time so dreaded? Isn't it through this very passing that we acquire experience? Why is being older so bad?

Older dogs may not have the effervescence of puppies--thank heavens--but they have plenty of energy to keep any human company in the exercise department. Older dogs don't have to chew on everything to figure out what they like; they already know what tastes good, what doesn't get them into trouble--and they can spend more time chewing that.

Relationships with older dogs are more fulfilling--more time spent in quiet contemplation rather than in a tug-of-war to establish who's who. Power struggles and pissing contests aren't necessary.

I think that's also true of our own relationships as we get older.

~ * ~

Thank you for visiting, for all your awesome comments, and for helping make Life In Dogs's 

first A-to-Z Challenge a huge success. 

I look forward to many, many mutual visits.

Who are you? (#atozchallenge)

A parent. Someone's child. Someone's friend. Married, single. A person of a certain sex. A graduate of a certain college. An employee at a certain firm. A performer of a certain job, certain sports, certain hobbies. A name. A family name.

Is that who you are? If these are just labels, then who are you? Are we what we do or what we like, even who we love? Or is there something more, something deeper?

And is that a fixed reality? Does that change?

If there is a constant with rescue dogs, it's change. Not just because of the lifestyle--dogs coming and going, new rescues, new adoptions--or because of their health issues--a liver enzyme acting up; an unheralded, and completely unreasonable, bout of diarrhea; sterilization complications--but because of the dogs themselves.

A dog that's taken in off the street has, suddenly, a lot to adapt to. A rescued dog is on the verge of transformation.

Who will he become? Will he remain fearful? Will he take over the pack? Will he be a mama's boy that doesn't leave his human's side unless compelled by chains and twenty-foot walls? Or will he find untapped sources of inner peace and become the zen master of the household?

Who a rescue dog is changes so fast.

This dog was surrendered to Tierra de Animales, a (wonderful) rescue organization in Cancún, México. She was in the car's trunk,  bound and blindfolded, because her owner said she was "vicious". She's certainly terrified--wouldn't you be, tied up and chocked into the trunk of a car on a hot day and taken who knows where? But not vicious.




This dog was lucky. She could've been abandoned out in the wild, tied to a tree, left to die. Instead, she came to a place without judgment, without labels. She'll be allowed to become whatever she wants to.

Oughtn't we to allow ourselves the same kindness? The same freedom?

If you do, if you dare, who will you become?

~ * ~

Thank you for stopping by, and happy A-to-Z-ing!

We're almost there!

View From Above (#atozchallenge)

Humans are taller than dogs. (Obviously, yes. But please bear with me.)

Unless you're a small child (or your dog is a 300-lb Great Dane), you stand at least three feet above your dog.

Which means you and your dog see different things.

Hey, human. How's it going up there?

I learned a lot from Brenda Aloff's Canine Body Language--more, probably, than I'll remember with any degree of effectiveness. But one thing that felt like a bucket of ice water on my head was this:

What happens at the dog's level often goes unnoticed at the human level.

Up here in Human Land it might look like two dogs are ignoring each other. But are they ignoring each other too hard? Maybe, down there in Dog World and out of (our) sight, the gauntlet is being thrown, tension is brewing, emotions are escalating. And when the growl or snap comes, human's all like, that came from nowhere!

No, it didn't. We just weren't looking.

Maybe there was a treat or a toy lying nearby, and one of the dogs wanted to claim it. Maybe one felt threatened by the other's size or demeanor. Maybe someone's space is being invaded. Maybe there's another dog approaching. Maybe the human is paying too much attention--or not enough--to one dog. Maybe--

Well. You get the idea.

Dog handlers need to train themselves to see these things. To step outside the human view and see the world from the dog's perspective. The things we consider important may not be important to them, and vice versa. Until we're able to see their world and the mechanics that rule it, we'll never understand them. We'll never be able to communicate properly.

And doesn't that apply to every relationship we have, canine or not?

~ * ~

Thanks for the visit, and happy A-to-Z-ing!

Us & Them (#atozchallenge)

I've had to stop taking all the dogs to the beach together, and I miss it. It was such a joy to watch them chase each other, splash into the water together, hunt in unison. Beautiful.

But unsafe.

Not when it was just the three of them--Panchita, Rusty, and Winter. If we ran into other dogs, they'd sniff a bit, Winter might get a bit snappy (she's short; Napoleon complex), but it never escalated. Same thing with people. None of my dogs like kids (they do say dogs resemble their owners...), but they behaved as long as the child didn't harass them. (And I made damn sure they didn't.)

Even when the puppies came. Puppies--they're 17 months now, but I guess they'll always be The Puppies to us. All seven of us (six of them, one of me) would walk the beaches like one big, friendly family.

And then they grew up.

Sometime around their 10-month birthday there was an incident. A couple of teenagers in a kayak got attacked. Sure, I told them to stop lunging with the oars at the dogs and they didn't listen, but in this world a dog is guilty until--no, no defense possible. A dog is guilty and stays guilty. Fortunately it wasn't even a scratch; no blood, no doctors.

But it taught me a powerful lesson.

In a pack, my dogs--my lovely, sweet, and wonderful dogs--become dangerous.

In a pack, accepting strangers--people or dogs--becomes impossible.

In a pack, all their little quirks of behavior that seem so manageable--or even harmless--at home become exacerbated, magnified, replicated like a mirror in a mirror.

They become a threat.*

Just like humans.

I'm not talking just about mobs (or soccer fans)--those are the ultimate extreme. Families, homeroom groups at school, neighborhoods, cities, countries, even continents: all of these give us a sense of identity. But in that very identity lies the problem. We define ourselves by differentiating from others.

There can be no Us without Them.

This behavior, the pack mentality, is so ingrained it probably resides in our lizard brain. Every animal has it; maybe even plants do. It's a matter of protecting resources, of survival; one can't just allow any dog to waltz in and take over our food, our human, our safety. Spontaneous generosity towards a stranger can be dangerous.

I get it. I do. We all need, in lesser or greater measure, a place to call home, a group to call our pack.

Strength lies in numbers, after all.

But I wonder. Can't we use it, this strength, for something other than division lines? 

Now I go to the beach with one, maybe two dogs. It's still Us, but I'm working on turning around that Us vs. Them into Us and Them.


It's a start.






* Note: Pack behavior that becomes a threat to others happens because of faulty leadership. Meaning me. My mistake, not theirs. I'm working on that, too.

~ * ~

Thanks for the visit, so sorry about the late post, and happy A-to-Z-ing!

(P.S. -- I will catch up on visits. There's so many great blogs I've discovered this April that I think I'll be busy until October reading everyone's A-to-Z posts.)

Sharing doesn't come naturally (#atozchallenge)

Those of you with kids know I'm right. A child's generosity, as cute as it might be when it happens, extends only until said child wants his toy back. It's only through training (okay, education) that we learn to share.

The instinct to protect resources is strong. Yep. In humans, too.

~ * ~

Thanks for the visit, and happy A-to-Z-ing!

Respect Is Peace (#atozchallenge)

Image credit

El respeto al derecho ajeno es la paz.

(Respect for the rights of others is peace.)

~ Emiliano Zapata, Mexican hero

Nothing illustrates that better than a pack of dogs.

If you've read the rescue stories of my dogs, you know it took time and effort--and a lot of patience--to get them to respect each other. When she first came home, Winter stole food from everyone. So did Sasha II. And Romy. They paid the blood price once or twice, but that's not what made them stop.

Respect doesn't come easy. Respect is like love: you can't demand that someone love you. Demanding--whether whiny or aggressive--just breeds fear. And fear is not respect.

Think of the people you respect. Why do you? Because you're scared of them, or the consequences non-respect would bring? Or is it their achievements, their grace, the way they deal with hardship and sorrow?

~ * ~ 

Thanks for the visit, and happy A-to-Z-ing!

P.S. -- I'm over at Vidya Sury's marvelous blog today sharing a

Disney-ending, tear-jerker dog rescue story.

Would love to see you there :)

Prejudice (#atozchallenge)

Sam, at three months.
Thank you, Claudia Sanches, for the lovely photos!

I hate to think this Lessons In Life From Dogs series might've given you the impression dogs are perfect, angelical beings, incapable of malice or dishonesty or other characteristically human nastiness. They are better than us, so much more in touch with themselves and their nature, so much more sincere and straightforward in their needs and desires. They have much to teach.

But they're far from perfect.

Take prejudice. I told you the story of Sam and the cow. (I'm sorry to bring it up again, but it's such a great example. And I'm in love with Sam.) He's terrified of this inanimate object, a fraction of his size, and which has never been party to any horrible or even mildly discomfiting experience. Sam's terror of this cow is not based on fact, on evidence of any kind.

It's prejudice.

I wish I spoke Dog so he could tell me on what grounds he discriminates against this cow. Is it racial? Color-based? I know she's somewhat gaudy, but--really? Or is it religion? (Cows are, after all, vegetarians.) Is it because the cow came from Holland? I know Sam is somewhat (haha--"somewhat," she says) xenophobic, but--again, really?

Maybe it's the cow's lowered head. Dogs--and wolves--do that just before sprinting after prey. It may be obvious to you and me that this cow is merely reaching down to graze, but Sam--because his experience is limited to dogs--doesn't see it that way.

Can't see it that way. Because of prejudice.

Is this ringing any bells? Because it sure is for me. I'm fervently anti-religion, and when I find out that someone is religious, there's an audible clunk as I slide them into the Disappointment slot in my mental archive. If someone likes Pink Floyd, on the other hand, they have an automatic pass into my Wow People slot. Accountants are boring, graphic designers are fun. Argentinian wine is excellent, Californian not so much. And rosé is for wannabes who can't handle their alcohol.

Do I have grounds for this continuous, if (until now) under-the-surface, distinctions? Of course I do--the same way Sam has clear and real reasons to fear that cow. And if there's no factual evidence to support my claim, no actual experience, I can always fall back on it's instinct.

But instinct isn't prejudice. Instinct relies--demands, even--an opening of the senses in order to gauge everything: sight, smell, feel, sound. What does it remind me of? Where have I seen something similar before? And is this new situation similar enough to warrant fear (or aggression or--gasp--rejection)?

Prejudice is judgment before the facts. Instinct is judgment through the facts.

In dogs, training gets rid of prejudice. The reason we train is precisely to get rid of a dog's prejudices: barking at the mailman, chasing cars. Counter-conditioning the response. I wonder if it would work for humans. Traveling, exposure to different cultures, different mindsets, different people. Is it really that simple?

And if it is, then why does prejudice still exist?

~ * ~

Thanks for the visit, and happy (Easter) A-to-Z-ing!

Over-exposed! (#atozchallenge)

Desensitization and counter-conditioning are the standard to deal with fearful or reactive behavior in dogs.

Controlled exposure, in carefully monitored increments, to the thing that causes fear. Conditioning the behavior so that the response to this thing will stop being fear--barking, lunging, growling, cowering--and become something positive.

What’s most effective is treatment that will change the way [the dog] feels about something. This treatment will eliminate the underlying reason for the behavior problem in the first place.

(ASPCA.org)

So a dog that's afraid of other dogs gets exposed to them: first at a distance, then a bit closer, then more, then without a fence, then a close encounter with one single (very friendly, very well-mannered) dog, then another, and another, then maybe two, then three, until--finally--he's ready for the dog park. The dog has learned, through this exposure, that other dogs aren't to be feared. If we're lucky, he might even have found out they're fun. At the very least, though, he won't tear that little Pomeranian to shreds the minute we look away.

But I wonder if there isn't such a thing as over-exposure.

Extreme sensitivity might be a bad thing--primarily for the dog, since it causes him/her angst and stress, and for the owner of that little Pomeranian--but sensitivity itself isn't. The ability to feel--isn't that what makes us alive?

Watch the news: murder, rape, corruption, betrayal, dishonesty, malice. War, death in massive numbers. We hear enough of it and it becomes rote. Routine. We begin to expect it: the way of the world.

When you heard about the Malaysian plane, did you cry? When you saw the George Zimmerman - Trayvon Martin story, were you outraged? When you read about a shop owner shot dead in the course of a robbery, do you mourn that life--and the social circumstances that caused its end?

Most people don't. Not, in any case, for longer than it takes to shake heads and switch channels. Because we're over-exposed. Exposure changes the way we feel about something. Exposure eliminates the underlying reason for the behavior. Death and cruelty, lack of integrity and prejudice--these things have become normal. They don't make us cringe anymore.

Over-exposure leaches out the color of life.

~ * ~

Thanks for the visit, and sorry about the late post. P coming soon(ish).

See you all around the A-to-Z water cooler.

Happy Easter weekend! 

No Fear Is Irrelevant (#atozchallenge)

This is Sam. The most reactive of my (seven) dogs.

He lives in fear: of the vacuum cleaner, the broom, a plastic bag dancing in the wind, a branch falling from a tree, the garbage truck, loud laughter from the neighbors', slamming doors, strangers, the street, my absence.

I get it. The human world is full of scary stuff for dogs. Mechanical stuff. Loud stuff. Stinky stuff (like the garbage truck). His fears might not be reasonable, but--I get it.

His abject terror of a cow, though, I don't.

Sam's nightmare cow

It's a four-inch-high decorative sculpture. Sure, the colors are maybe gaudy, and the thing has horns, and the head is down low (stalk/attack position), but--seriously? It's an inanimate object. You'd think a dog, with their outrageous sense of smell, would be able to tell there's no danger here, imminent or potential. And yet he won't even get close enough to sniff it.

It's a fifth of your size, Sam! Stop being such a drama queen! (Or king, whatever.)

Completely by accident, I came across a post (by Eileen, one of my favorite dog people): Is My Dog A Drama Queen? Ha, thought I, this one's for Sam.

No. It was for me.

About halfway through the post I found this (Zani is Eileen's Sam):

"I need to remind myself that this house, with my other dogs and me, and the places Zani gets to go–these things are Zani’s world. She is utterly dependent on me. She has things she likes and dislikes, things she looks forward to or not. They are perfectly real and important to her."

And then:

"I need to take Zani’s frustrations and stresses seriously, not just brush them away as cute, silly, or annoying. [...] I need to change my internal response."

Bam. 

We've established dogs cannot lie--they're, quite literally, incapable of it--so why don't I take him seriously? Why am I labeling his reactions as "drama"? Because from my point of view his fear of the cow is unreasonable? Unjustified?

Who am I to judge?

I think I do this with people, too. I have very low (read zero) tolerance for drama queens. Your boyfriend cheated on you, your wallet got stolen, you crashed your car and don't have insurance, you lost your job, your house burned down? Here, have a kleenex, have a drink. Stop the sniveling, it's not the end of the world.

Isn't it? Maybe it is drama--or maybe, for that person, this thing that's happened really does feel like the end of the world. Who am I to judge?

My decorative cow is the stuff of Sam's nightmares. One person's drama is another person's abject terror. A good human--a good friend--should understand that.

~ * ~ 

Thanks for the visit, and happy A-to-Z-ing!

[Want more Lessons In Life From Dogs?]

Frustration: The Root of All Evil

I've been having issues with my dogs. Defensiveness with strangers (i.e., pack behavior). Some escapes, some aggression, some fights. One of my dogs, little Sasha, has been to the vet a few times already for stitches.

That's not good.

So I called a couple of trainer friends for help. What am I doing wrong? What could I do better? Most importantly, what's the source of the tension, and what can I do about it? Can I do anything about it?

After an hour observing the dogs here at home, they told me: it's frustration.

Frustration?

Yes, said they. The three puppies (fifteen months old now) were born here, right? They never left?

Right, said I.

That's the problem, they said. When dogs aren't exposed to new things on a regular basis, especially early in life, they never learn to deal with change.

Change being, well, anything new. A new noise. A new person. A new dog behind the neighbor's fence (the current catalyst). Instead of adaptation, change produces major freak-out.

Several years ago, I was hired by a hotel company and sent for a two-month training to one of their resorts in Dominican Republic. Another new employee, a girl from Curaçao, was there at the same time. She had never lived outside of Curaçao, and was horribly homesick. (I say "girl", but she was perhaps 28.)

She spent two hours on the phone every night with her mother. She never smiled. She lost weight.

This was one of those all-inclusive places that serve everything--Japanese, Italian, Chinese, Greek. All-American burgers and hotdogs. A variety of fruit beyond belief. An omelette bar. A salad bar. A Brazilian evening with cuts of buttery beef. A seafood evening with more giant shrimp than I could eat (that's saying a lot).

But my new colleague wouldn't eat any of it. She'd never had it before, wasn't interested in trying it. "Why should I? In Curaçao we're fortunate; we don't have to leave our country to make a living."

And yet there she was, stuck in an alien place for seven weeks. (And I mean, really, how "alien" can a Caribbean island be from another Caribbean island?)

By Week Three she'd had arguments with every one of the employees who were supposed to be training us. Instead of spending weekends at the beach, she locked herself in her room and talked 24/7 with her mom.

Frustration. Major freak-out.

Hers is an extreme case, but aren't we all guilty of this, in smaller or greater measure? Of pretending our lives will continue the same way they always have, of rejecting new things (people, food, ideas) because they're different from what we're used to?

We find comfort in routine, but--at least in this--there may be such a thing as too much of a good thing.

On the trainers' suggestion, I'm now taking one dog out every day to do something new. Walk downtown. Explore a new beach. Get lost in the Kabouterbos (literally: gnome forest) that's about a mile from the house. Expose the dogs to something new every day so that change will stop freaking them out. After a full week, I'm already seeing results.

And not just in the dogs.

Downward-Facing Dog (#atozchallenge)

Do you listen to your body?

No, don't answer so quickly. When you get a headache, do you pop an aspirin or do you drink four glasses of water? How often do you go to the doctor? How often do you get sick?

How often do you sleep a full eight hours? And talking about sleep, how well do you sleep? Are you a toss-and-turner? Do you wake up tired? Do you wake up stressed? How often do you stretch?

How often do you have a craving for, say, broccoli? Brussel sprouts? Spinach? Do you eat because you're hungry, or because--dang, it's noon, gotta eat? Do you keep on eating because this fried chicken is sooo good, oh yum, finger lick?

I ask again. Do you listen to your body?

Dogs do. In fact, I'm willing to bet humans are the only animals that have so radically lost touch with our physical selves.

It's kind of like the common ground thing from yesterday. Like dogs, our bodies are constantly communicating with us; we've just stopped listening.

So listen. Stretch regularly. Eat when you're hungry. Don't overeat. Go to bed earlier. And don't stress.

Stress is a physiological response to fear, to lack of control--yep, learned that from "dog" training, too--so figure out what's making you fearful. Most things aren't within our sphere of influence, but there's a lot we can do to make situations more manageable.

For me, it has to do with organization. For dogs, it's having a strong pack leader they can trust. We humans have to be our own pack leaders. What do you need to do in order to trust yourself to solve / handle the situation? It's probably something that'll take you out of your comfort zone--these things usually do.

But it's worth it.

Go on. Give it a try. And give yourself a treat when you accomplish it.

Common Ground (#atozchallenge)

"Dog training" is a misnomer. It makes one think that it's the dog that's going to be trained.

In fact, it's the human.

Good human. I knew you'd get it eventually.

The dog's going to learn all sorts of nifty tricks, but the human... The human's outlook on life will go through tectonic transformation.

What dog training achieves is communication. Effective, two-way communication.

Surprised? Your dog won't be. For him/her, you've been communicating all along (body language, remember?). Not very efficiently, but communicating nonetheless. If you listen closely, you might hear a sigh of relief (finally! this human is getting it!). But surprise? Amazement? No. Dogs don't underestimate us.

We, on the other hand... Well, it's understandable. We headed over to our neighborhood trainer for housebreaking chew-it-all issues and all of a sudden--ohmygod, the dog speaks! And listens! He understands us! And we can understand him!

See, what these "dog" training sessions do is help us establish a common ground. Because there is no possibility for effective communication without a common ground.

Double OK sign means "I want to stay down here
forever." (Yes, that's me.)

Have you ever visited a foreign country whose language you didn't speak? Or imagine that proverbial scenario of the (friendly) alien landing in your backyard. Sign language, you say? Unless the signs mean the same thing to both of you, you might be getting into worse trouble.

Example: for pilots, a thumbs-up sign means OK. For divers, the sign for OK is a circle with thumb and forefinger. Thumbs-up means, literally, UP--which creates misunderstandings, some funny, some life-threatening, between a pilot and his dive instructor.

Without going to foreign, or alien, or underwater, or 30-mile-high extremes, finding common ground for communication--even though it seems like, well, common sense--is something we too often fail to do. Every individual in our small, daily world has a unique language, a unique background that shapes the way they express themselves.

Failure to accept this is what leads to prejudice.

Without a trainer to interpret for others--and for us--it's up to each one of us to make the effort. Listen. Don't jump to conclusions. Don't assume everyone uses words in the same way we do, or with the same intentions.

Let's make sure we find, at least try to find, that common ground. Before getting angry or hurt at what someone says.