In exactly twenty-four hours from now, you will have the opportunity to listen to Kyle Dunlap of the radio station KAJO interviewing me about my book: Learning from Dogs.
The interview, that was pre-recorded on the 23rd November, is part of KAJO’s community broadcasts where they speak to local authors. As a newbie author, I was delighted and flattered to be asked to participate.
Anyway!
The broadcast is a little after 12:45 Pacific Standard Time on Tuesday, 8th December. If you are not in the USA, you can check the equivalent time easily at The World Clock website.
You will see the On Air button to click just to the right of the KAJO 1270am logo. Here is the “Click to Listen Live” button grabbed from the KAJO website at 3:20pm yesterday.
It will have Kyle Dunlap’s name on it when you “tune in” at 12:45 tomorrow.
If you do listen to the interview do leave a comment below – good or bad! đ
What clues does your dogâs spit hold for human mental health?
This is not a spoof. Apparently the closeness of the relationship between dogs and humans holds real scientific value.
Just my way of introducing a most fascinating and interesting item that recently appeared on The Conversation blogsite. (And see my note at the end of today’s post.)
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What clues does your dogâs spit hold for human mental health?
December 2, 2015
Elixir Karlsson, Assistant Professor of Bioinformatics and Integrative Biology, University of Massachusetts Medical School
There goes some precious DNAâŚ. Graeme Bird, CC BY-NC-ND
Dogs were the first animals people domesticated, long before the earliest human civilizations appeared. Today, tens of thousands of years later, dogs have an unusually close relationship with us. They share our homes and steal our hearts â and have even evolved to love us back. Sadly, they also suffer from many of the same difficult-to-treat psychiatric and neurological diseases we do.
I learned this firsthand about six years ago, when my sister Adria adopted Beskow, a beautiful,
Beskow, in fine spirits. Elinor Karlsson, CC BY-ND
boisterous, black and white mutt. Beskow became my constant companion on my morning runs along the Charles River. Her joy in running was obvious to everyone we passed, and she kept me going mile after mile.
When not running, though, Beskow suffered from constant anxiety that left her stressed and unhappy â on edge around other dogs and prone to aggressive behavior. Beskow had trouble even playing outdoors, since she was compelled to attend to every sound and movement. Working one-on-one with skilled behaviorists and trainers helped immensely, but poor Beskow still never seemed able to relax. Eventually, Adria combined the intensive training with medication, which finally seemed to give Beskow some relief.
Beskowâs personality â her intelligence, her focus and her anxiety â was shaped not only by her own life experiences, but by thousands of years of evolution. Have you ever known a dog who would retrieve the same ball over and over again, for hours on end? Or just wouldnât stay out of the water? Or wasnât interested in balls, or water, but just wanted to follow her nose? These dogs are the result of hundreds of generations of artificial selection by human beings. By favoring useful behaviors when breeding dogs, we made the genetic changes responsible more common in their gene pool.
When a particular genetic change rapidly rises in prevalence in a population, it leaves a âsignature of selectionâ that we can detect by sequencing the DNA of many individuals from the population. Essentially, around a selected gene, we find a region of the genome where one particular pattern of DNA â the variant linked to the favored version of the gene â is far more common than any of the alternative patterns. The stronger the selection, the bigger this region, and the easier it is to detect this signature of selection.
In dogs, genes shaping behaviors purposely bred by humans are marked with large signatures of selection. Itâs a bit like evolution is shining a spotlight on parts of the dog genome and saying, âLook here for interesting stuff!â To figure out exactly how a particular gene influences a dogâs behavior or health, though, we need lots more information.
To try to unravel these connections, my colleagues and I are launching a new citizen science research project weâre calling Darwinâs Dogs. Together with animal behavior experts, weâve put together a series of short surveys about everything from diet (does your dog eat grass?) to behavior (is your dog a foot sitter?) to personality (is your dog aloof or friendly?).
Any dog can participate in Darwinâs Dogs, including purebred dogs, mixed breed dogs, and mutts of no particular breed â our studyâs participants will be very genetically diverse. Weâre combining new DNA sequencing technology, which can give us much more genetic information from each dog, with powerful new analysis methods that can control for diverse ancestry. By including all dogs, we hope to be able to do much larger studies, and home in quickly on the important genes and genetic variants.
A beagle considers making the saliva donation. Stephen Schaffner, CC BY-ND
Once an owner has filled out the survey, thereâs a second, crucial step. We send an easy-to-use kit to collect a small dog saliva sample we can use for DNA analysis. Thereâs no cost, and weâll share any information we find.
Our plan is to combine the genetic data from many dogs and look for changes in DNA that correlate with particular behaviors. It wonât be easy to match up DNA with an obsession with tennis balls, for instance. Behavior is a complex trait that relies on many genes. Simple Mendelian traits, like Beskowâs black and white coat, are controlled by a single gene which determines the observable characteristic. This kind of inherited trait is comparatively easy to map. Complex traits, on the other hand, may be shaped by tens or even hundreds of different genetic changes, each of which on its own only slightly alters the individual carrying it.
Adding to the complexity, environment often plays a big role. For example, Beskow may not have been as anxious if sheâd lived with Adria from puppyhood, even though her genetics would be unchanged.
Darwinâs Dogs team member Jesse McClure extracts DNA from a sample. Elinor Karlsson, CC BY-ND
To succeed, we need a lot of dogs to sign up. Initially, weâre aiming to enroll 5,000 dogs. If successful, weâll keep growing. With bigger sample sizes, weâll be able to tackle even more complex biological puzzles.
Understanding the biology underlying a disease is the first step in developing more effective treatments â of both the canine and human variety. For example, genetic studies of narcolepsy in Doberman pinschers found the gene mutation causing the disease â but only in this one dog population. Researching the geneâs function, though, led to critical new insights into the molecular biology of sleep, and, eventually, to new treatment options for people suffering from this debilitating disease.
Darwinâs Dogs is investigating normal canine behaviors as well as diseases. We hypothesize that finding the small genetic changes that led to complex behaviors, like retrieving, or even personality characteristics, like playfulness, will help us figure out how brains work. We need this mechanistic understanding to design new, safe and more effective therapies for psychiatric diseases.
And Beskow? Six years later, she is as wonderful as ever. While still anxious some of the time, the
Beskow with one of her loving family members. Adria Karlsson, CC BY-ND
medication and training have paid off, and she enjoys her daily walks, training and playtime. She still gets very nervous around other dogs, but is a gentle, playful companion for my sisterâs three young children.
We are now sequencing her genome. In the next few months, we should have our first glimpse into Beskowâs ancestry. We know she is a natural herder, so weâre curious to find out how much her genome matches up to herding breeds, and which genes are in that part of the genome.
This is an incredibly interest research project with far-reaching implications for us humans. I have written to Professor Karlsson to double-check that anyone who reads this can participate, even if living outside the USA, and will update this post as soon as I hear back from her.
Do share this as far and wide as you can for the benefits for us humans are clear and obvious.
Not a week goes by without me gaining more and deeper understanding of just how wonderful and fabulous our dogs are.
Your dog can cue to you open the door by ringing a bell, but how about taking it to the next level and teaching your dog to open the door by himself? In fact, there’s a handy trick built into this that we will introduce later on! This video walks you through all the steps to opening doors and drawers:
Hold an object
If your dog likes to play fetch or tug, it may be a great idea to teach him how to hold and carry an object. It’s a new way for a dog to think about holding a toy, since once the dog has a grip on it, he needs to wait for you to give the cue to release it. This trick is also included in a more complicated trick, which is next on our list. But first, here’s a video that shows you how to master this trick:
Fetch something from the fridge or cupboard
When you have the training down for touch, opening the door, knowing the names of objects, and holding an object, it’s just a matter of putting the steps together to teach your dog to fetch an item from somewhere in the house. A popular version of this trick is of course to fetch a beer from the fridge! But maybe start out with a less fizzy drink option, just in case.
Back up
An interesting trick to teach your senior dog is how to walk backwards. It’s a great one to help with getting him to think about using his body a little differently. Most dogs aren’t really aware of where their hind end is â it’s just the part that follows their front end. By teaching your dog to walk backward, you’re teaching him to be aware of where his back legs are going. It’s great for both mental and physical agility.
Find it
Keep life interesting for your dog by creating a game around using his nose to find a reward. This is a great trick especially for dogs whose hearing or sight has diminished with age. The trick teaches them to use their noses even more purposefully, using scent work to find the hidden treat or toy. Once you teach your dog how to find it, you can have the “it” be something different every time you play to keep your dog at the top of his game. This video shows an older Labrador learning the steps to the “find it” game and having fun playing:
Tuck himself in bed
It’s surprising how much fun you can have with a trick that only requires your dog to grab a blanket and roll over. This adorable trick is great for dogs of any age, and is an easy (and cozy) trick for your senior dog to learn. You simply teach your dog to lie down on a blanket, grab and hold the corner of it, and roll over so he tucks himself into bed. For senior dogs who like to snooze in extra warm blankets, this is a dream trick. Here’s how it works:
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So there you are. Plenty to keep you and your senior dogs engaged for a long time. Once again, if you missed part one then that was published yesterday.
The household here in Oregon has a number of seniors, both dogs and humans. And while I’m pretty sure that this senior human is practically past the point of learning new tricks, apparently it doesn’t apply to our old dogs.
So enjoy this recent article that appeared on Mother Nature News.
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Teaching an old dog new tricks is not only possible, but a lot of fun!
By: Jaymi Heimbuch, November 30, 2015
Old dogs can learn new tricks with ease! (Photo: Annette Shaff/Shutterstock)
The old saying goes that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but we know a lot of old sayings are wrong â this one included. Of course we can teach old dogs new tricks! In fact, it’s a great way to keep your dog mentally stimulated and having fun throughout his life.
One important thing to keep in mind about teaching senior dogs new tricks and behaviors is the dog’s level of physical ability. Many senior dogs are perfectly able, but if your dog is getting achy in the joints or has other limitations that come with age, keep these in mind. Older dogs may have joint pain or arthritis and have a harder time jumping or even sitting for long periods. They may also have dental issues which may limit the tricks they can do using their mouths. And they may also have hearing or vision problems which alter not only what kinds of tricks you want to teach them but also the way in which you teach them. So it’s important to know what your dog’s physical limitations are when you’re thinking up new tricks, and not push him to the point of possible injury.
While your dog may be past the days of learning to jump through hoops or leap over walls, there is a huge range of tricks that keep mobility issues in mind, and which senior dogs will have a lot of fun learning. Some of the tricks listed here build on each other and gain complexity, so you can keep things interesting for your dog for weeks at a time while training.
Touch
This is such a great trick to use as a foundation for other tricks, from flipping light switches on or off to coming back to your side. And it’s incredibly easy for your dog to learn and do. This is great for older dogs because you can make it really simple at first and build complexity into it after your dog has it down. To start out, you train your dog to do hand targeting. Here’s a video that shows not only how to train your dog to touch your hand, but many of the uses of the behavior:
Teaching your dog to yawn is all about “capturing behavior” with clicker training. It’s much like training your dog “touch” but this time, you have to wait for your dog to offer the behavior and capture it when it happens. Click â or say a key word like “Yes” â whenever you catch your dog yawning, and then reward him with treats or a game with a toy. After awhile, your dog begins to associate the yawn as being a trick that earns a reward. Here’s a video that demonstrates capturing different behaviors that you can turn into cute tricks, including yawning on command:
Even when you’re a grown-up, you have to pick up your toys when you’re done playing. Teaching your dog this tidy behavior will keep him or her a little more active in a low-key way, and thus help loosen up those stiff joints and muscles without putting a strain on their body. Plus, it’s a fun game that you can play over and over, not just on clean-up duty.
Stretch your dog’s mental abilities by teaching him the name of different objects or toys. This is a great way to teach your dog to fetch certain items from the toy box or even various objects from around house. You can start off with a few items from the toy box or simply get rolling with items you may want him to fetch for you, including hats, keys, shoes, blankets and so on.
Though it may take a while for your dog to truly grasp the name for each item at first, soon he will catch on to what the name game is all about and will likely grasp names faster when introduced to new objects.
Here’s a video that shows how to begin teaching a dog the name of an item, and how to add more items into the mix:
Your senior dog may be house-trained, but is he also trained to tell you precisely when he wants or needs to go out? You can give your older dog a great tool to tell you what he needs by teaching him to ring a bell as a cue to go outside. This video shows the progression of teaching a dog to touch the bell, and then eventually transition to learning that ringing the bell means their human opens the door for them.
For a few hours ago the WordPress theme I am using on Learning from Dogs was changed.
The change is necessary to allow a number of eCommerce features to be added to the blog in connection with me being able to sell my book, both in paperback and eBook formats, directly to you good people.
Plus there’s a real bonus.
This theme is mobile friendly.
In other words, everything on Learning from Dogs will be much, much easier to read on tablets and smartphones.
Finally, if anyone is within reach of Grants Pass then you have a warm welcome to come along on Saturday, December 12th. There will be some specials available to visitors only.
Dave’s Pet Food of Agawam, Massachusetts, has confirmed it is voluntarily recalling one production lot of its Dave’s Simply the Best dry dog food due to the presence of an “off odor”.
To learn which products are affected, please visit the following link:
At first, this may seem like a rather bizarre question.
Before plunging in to today’s post, can I just explain, especially to those who are new to this place, why there has been a preponderance of republished articles from other sources in recent times. (And that’s not to say that these articles aren’t fascinating reads; by the way.)
While my book is now available, I am still just over a week away from a formal launch, both here on Learning from Dogs, and locally in the town of Grants Pass. However, the level of demands upon me in connection with the launch is building rapidly. For example, on Friday a team from the local Daily Courier are coming here in connection with a feature article that they want to write. On Saturday, Jean and I have a stand at a local craft fair. Next Tuesday I have my fingers crossed that there will be a radio broadcast from local KAJO about the book on their local community slot. (More details will be published here once the time and day has been confirmed.)
I’m sure you get the picture!
So with all that out of the way, here’s a wonderful sequel to my recent posts on Stillness and Happiness. It is a fascinating essay from Val Boyco under the heading of  W.A.I.T., republished with Val’s kind permission.
I love to work with people on becoming better communicators. The key, of course, is to learn to really listen â becoming engaged listeners and tuning into the other person, rather than letting our own thoughts take us away from the moment and distract us.
But before we even get to this step, there is one vital piece of wisdom to absorb.
When we are talking we are not listening.
So, the question to ask yourself is : Why Am I Talking?âŚ
Have you ever considered why you are talking? It is usually more than sharing valuable information; thatâs for sure!
Next time you notice you are talking, consider these questions:
Am I trying to release something thatâs bottled up?
Am I trying to persuade someone to my point of view?
Is it a habit?
Am I trying to work through something out loud?
Do I have an unmet personal need that I am trying to get met? For example: a need for validation, attention, love, approval, recognition or to be right.
Do I find talking entertaining?
Am I uncomfortable with silence?
Do I believe that people really need all the information I am providing, that I am being helpful or teaching something?
To explore more, you may want to write W.A.I.T.? on a post-it note before your next meeting and notice what comes up for you.
When we become aware of our talking, we are in a better position to choose whether we want to continue or not. Enjoy tuning in to yourself this week.. and this video.
An insight into the eating behaviours of cats and dogs.
As it happens, Jean and I are vegetarians; Jean going way back in years to when she first turned away from meat. Thus the only meat that we purchase is from Cartwrights’, a local butcher in Grants Pass, where we buy hearts and liver for the dogs. The cats are fed on dried cat biscuits and canned cat food.
All owners of cats and dogs know that they have very different eating habits, and behaviours.
So to put some flesh on the bone, so to speak, about the eating behaviours of cats and dogs I am going to republish a recent essay that appeared over on The Conversation. As always, it is republished within the terms of The Conversation.
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Why cats are fussy eaters but dogs will consume almost anything
by Hannah Rowland, Lecturer in Ecology and Evolution & Research Fellow at Zoological Society of London, University of Cambridge
November 13, 2015
Anyone whoâs watched a cat throwing up after munching on grass knows that our feline friends arenât natural plant eaters. So you might be surprised to discover that these carnivorous animals share some important genes that are more typically associated with herbivores. And this might help explain why cats arenât always easy to please when it comes to food.
New research suggests that cats possess the genes that protect vegetarian animals from ingesting poisonous plants by giving them the ability to taste bitter. Animals use their sense of taste to detect whether a potential food is nutritious or harmful. A sweet taste signals the presence of sugars, an important source of energy. A bitter taste, on the other hand, evolved as a defence mechanism against harmful toxins commonly found in plants and unripe fruits.
Evolution has repeatedly tweaked animals’ taste buds to suit various dietary needs. Changes in an animalâs diet can eliminate the need to sense certain chemicals in food, and so receptor genes mutate, destroying their ability to make a working protein.
I can haz chlorophyll. Lisa Sympson/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA
One example of this comes from strictly meat-eating cats, who can no longer taste sweetness. But if bitter detection evolved to warn of plant toxins, then it stands to reason that cats, which (usually) eschew plants, shouldnât be able to taste bitter either. Humans and other vegetable-munching animals can taste bitter because we possess bitter taste receptor genes. If cats have lost the ability to taste bitterness, we should find that their receptor genes are riddled with mutations.
Geneticists at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia scoured the genome of cats and other carnivorous mammals like dogs, ferrets, and polar bears to see if our carnivorous cousins have bitter genes. They were surprised to find that cats have 12 different genes for bitter taste. Dogs, ferrets, and polar bears are equally well endowed. So, if meat eating animals are unlikely to encounter any bitter morsels, why do they boast genes for tasting bitterness?
Taste test
To find out, Peihua Jiang, a molecular biologist at Monell, put cat taste buds to the test. He inserted the cat taste receptor gene into human tissue cells in the lab. When combined, the cell and the gene act as a taste receptor that responds to chemicals dropped onto it.
Jiang discovered that the catâs taste receptors responded to bitter chemicals found in toxic plants and to compounds that also activate human bitter receptors. The cat bitter taste receptor, known as Tas2r2, responded to the chemical denatonium benzoate, a bitter substance commonly smeared on the fingernails of nail-biting children.
So why have cats retained the ability to detect bitter tastes? Domestic cats owners know how unpredictable cats’ dietary choices can be. Some of the âpresentsâ cats bring to their owners include frogs, toads, and other animals that can contain bitter and toxic compounds in their skin and bodies. Jiangâs results show that bitter receptors empower cats to detect these potential toxins, giving them the ability to reject noxious foods and avoid poisoning.
Hair of the dog. Michal Hrabovec/Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA
But how often do meat-loving cats actually get exposed to bitter and toxic compounds in their diet, compared with the plethora of plant toxins that their vegetarian counterparts have to contend with? Jiang suggests this is not enough to explain why cats have retained such an arsenal of receptors.
Instead, cat taste receptors may have evolved for reasons other than taste. In humans, bitter taste receptors are found not only in the mouth, but also in the heart and in the lungs, where they are thought to detect infections. It remains to be seen if feline bitter receptor genes also double-up as disease detectors.
The discovery of feline bitter receptors might explain why cats have got a reputation as picky eaters. But their unfussy canine counterparts have a similar number of bitter taste receptors â so why are cats so finicky? One answer might lie in how the cat receptors detect bitter-tasting compounds. Research published earlier this year by another team of researchers showed that some of the cat taste receptors are especially sensitive to bitter compounds, and even more sensitive to denatonium than the same receptor in humans.
Perhaps cats are also more sensitive to bitter chemicals than dogs, or they may detect a greater number of bitter compounds in their everyday diet. Food that tastes bland to us or to a dog could be an unpleasant gastronomic experience for cats. So rather than branding cats as picky, perhaps we should think of them as discerning feline foodies.
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Once again, I find it wonderful and incredible that there is so much knowledge and experience “out there” and how quickly a few clicks of a computer mouse can make it available to all of you wonderful readers!
And with that, it’s time to go off and feed the dogs. (Only showing off – Jean is the one who feeds both our dogs and our cats!)
According to a notice posted at PetSmart retail stores, Hill’s Science Diet is in the process of conducting a voluntary market withdrawal of some of its canned dog food products for unspecified reasons.
To learn which products are affected, please visit the following link:
Twenty-one things my dog taught me about being a better man.
June 7, 2010 by Olivier Blanchard
We had to put our golden retriever to sleep this weekend, our friend of fifteen years, our familyâs faithful guardian and companion, and one of the kindest, most loyal and giving souls I have ever met. True to her breed, Sasha was courageous, tender and selfless until the end.
I was trying to figure out how to give her a worthy send-off here on The BrandBuilder blog, and settled on some of the things she taught me over the years. Or rather, the things I didnât realize she had taught me until this past week, much of which I spent caring for her, as she could no longer take care of herself. She and I had some long chats, in our own way, and the old girl was much wiser than I gave her credit for.
Are there business lessons in this list? Yes. There are. But all are deeply human lessons at the core. If being human can make a business better, if it can fuel its soul (or even simply give it one), then yes, let these be business lessons. But donât ever forget that what makes a business truly great isnât technology or design or a fancy logo. Those are expressions of something deeper. Something more visceral and powerful and true. What makes a business great, what makes it special, worthy of a connection, worthy of trust and loyalty, admiration and respect, even love, always starts with a beating heart, not a beeping cash register. (One is the cause, and the other one of many effects. Donât lose sight of that distinction. Horse before cart: Soul drives love. Love drives business.)
Itâs so easy to lose sight of whatâs important in our lives. And this isnât me being overly sentimental because I just lost my dog. I mean, yes, sure, okay⌠But thereâs also something to this: That sentimentality, that emotion, these things that make us connect with other souls is at the heart of EVERYTHING this blog has been about these last few years: Business, design, marketing, social media, communications, corporate responsibility, best practices⌠No company can ever be great unless it can tap into the very essence of what makes us want to connect with each other, and no executive or business manager or cashier can ever truly be great at their jobs unless they also tap into the very thing that makes genuine human connections possible. If ever there was a secret to successfully building a brand, a lovebrand, the kind that people will fight for and whose mark they will tattoo on their bodies, it is this. The rest is merely execution.
If you only walk away with one bit of wisdom from this post, let it be this: You cannot build a better business unless you first become a better human being. Everything that strips you of your humanity, of your empathy, of your ability to connect with others is bad for business. Itâs bad practice. It is doomed to fail in the end.
As my good friend John Warner noted yesterday, âIf more people were as loyal and loving as dogs the world would be a better place.â (source) And heâs right. How do you become a better human being then? Well, thatâs up to you, but if you had asked Sasha, she might have given you a few pointers of her own. Granted, she was never a Fortune 500 C.M.O. She didnât design the iPad. She didnât invent the internet or write a book. She never presented at a conference. All she did was hang out with me and Chico. We went on car rides. She watched me work. She lived the simple life of a dog, uncluttered by Twitter followers and Hubspot rankings and the drive to publish and present case studies. She was a dog, and so her perspective is a little different from what you may be used to. At any rate, here are twenty-one she and I discussed at length last week. I hope they will be as valuable to you as they now are to me.
Twenty-one things my dog taught me about being a better man:
1. Be true to your own nature. Thereâs no point in faking it. A golden retriever isnât a chihuahua or a pug or a greyhound, and for good reason. Being comfortable in your own skin is 90% of the trick to rocking out your life. Not everyone is meant to be Rintintin or a seeing-eye dog or an Iditarod racer. Itâs okay. Find yourself and embrace your nature. Thatâs always a great place to start.
2. Be true to the ones you love. Your friends, your family, your tribe, your pack. A life lived for others is a life well-lived. Selfish pursuits aside, ambition often grows hollow when turned inwardly instead of outwardly. Itâs one thing to want to be pack leader, but there is just as much value and honor in serving than in leading. When in doubt, see item number one.
3. Never say no to a chance to go on a car ride. When the days grow short, I guarantee youâll wish youâd have gone on more car rides.
4. Leashes are the enemy. Avoid them at all cost.
5. People are strange. So much potential, yet here they are, doing everything they can to complicate rather than simplify their lives. Itâs puzzling.
6. Belly scratches.
7. The end isnât pretty, but if you can face it with dignity and grace, none of your bodyâs weaknesses will matter. Your heart, your courage, your spirit is what people will see and remember. This isnât only applicable in your last days and weeks. Itâs applicable every day of your life. Adversity happens. Itâs how you deal with it that matters.
8. Forgiveness is easier for dogs than for humans, but humans have opposable thumbs and the ability to speak, so it all balances out in the end.
9. Your bark is your own. No one has one quite like yours. Own it. Love it. Project it.
10. Trust your instincts. They rarely steer you wrong. The feeling in your gut though, thatâs probably just something you ate.
11. Just because youâre meant to live on land doesnât mean you canât feel at home in water. Play outside the safety zone. Swim in the deep end. Dive in. Weâre all designed to do more than the obvious.
12. Play more. The game is irrelevant. Just play. Tip: Exploring is play. Having adventures is play. Finding out whatâs behind the next hill is play.
13. Your body growing old doesnât mean you canât be a puppy at heart. Actually, the first should have no impact on the latter. If you find that it does, take a step back, regroup, and restart. Always be a puppy at heart.
14. Humans arenât all bad. But they arenât all good either. Choose yours wisely.
15. Always keep that 20% wolf in you. If you ever give it up, youâre done. A dog without a little wildness in the blood isnât a dog. Itâs a furry robot. The beauty of a great dog doesnât lie in its obedience but in its loyalty. Loyalty is a choice. Dogs choose to be dogs and not wolves. Thatâs what makes them so special.
16. Running full bore across a field in the rain.
17. There are no mysteries. Take cats, for example: Half rat, half badger. Crap in a box. Eat rodents. Whereâs the mystery in that? If you look hard enough, you can figure most things out for yourself. The world isnât as complicated as it sometimes seems.
18. Sometimes, you have to back up your growl with a bite. Go with it. Some people like to test your bark-to-bite ratio. With those âinquisitiveâ types, a little education goes a long way. As much as it sucks to have to go there, it is sometimes necessary. (Itâs what the fangs are for.) Your territory, your space, your safety⌠Theyâre worth defending. Make a show of it once, and chances are youâll never have to teach anyone a lesson again.
19. Being alone is no way to go through life. Weâre pack animals. Humans, dogs, same thing. We need others to make all of this worthwhile. As an aside, if we live through others, why not also live for others, even if only a little bit? It isnât that much of a stretch.
20. When you chase the ball, CHASE the fucking ball. Two reasons: a) Itâs a chase. You donât half-ass a chase. You go all out. Itâs what you do. Itâs the point. b) You donât want some other mutt to get to the ball before you and slobber it all up, do you?
21. In the end, you will revisit your adventures, your battles, your chases, your voyages and all the excitement of your life with bemused pride, but itâs the quiet moments with loved ones that your mind will settle on. The comfort of those days when all you did was spend lazy hours with them, your head on their lap, their’s on yours, taking in the afternoon sun and the hundreds of fleeting stories carried like whispers on the breeze, those are the memories that will stay with you to the end and beyond.
Never give up on your thirst for life, on the beauty subtle moments, and on chasing that ball as hard and fast as your legs and heart will carry you.
Godspeed, Sasha.
Sasha (1995 – 2010) R.I.P.
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Shortly after completing today’s post, I read the following. It seemed appropriate to include it today.
When you talk, you are only repeating what you know,
Learning from Dogs 