So far, so good!

Yesterday, I offered you, dear reader, my foreword, as it were.  It was a fictional account of the coming together of man and grey wolf that over many thousands of years led to the domesticated dog that so many millions of us know and love.

Yes, it’s fiction but it’s not entirely improbable.  I say that because on the 20th May this year, I wrote about a meeting with a Grey Wolf that had been born in captivity yet not born a tame creature, far from it.  The post was called Musings on Love and included this picture of that Grey Wolf, Tundra.  The picture was taken by me just a few moments before I received a gentle lick on the face.

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Moving on.  This is Chapter One set some 30,000 years, give or take, after Omo reached out to those injured wolf cubs.  Bet she had no idea what she started! 😉

Once again, all feedback welcomed.  Your support, as conveyed yesterday, is incredible.  Thank you so much.

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Learning from Dogs

Chapter One

Philip stood very still as Sandra approached with the golden-brown puppy in her arms.  The puppy was an exquisite, miniature version of the fully-grown German Shepherd dogs that were on view elsewhere about Sandra’s kennels.

It was unusually warm this September day and Philip had unbuttoned the cuffs of his blue-white checked cotton shirt and folded his shirt sleeves back above both elbows.  Sandra offered the young, male puppy to Philip and he took it tenderly into his arms and cradled the gorgeous creature against his chest.  The pup’s warm body seemed to glow through its gleaming fur and the moment of contact was pure magic.  As Philip’s bare forearms touched the soft, sensuous flanks of this quiet, little creature something registered in Philip’s consciousness in ways that couldn’t be articulated but, nonetheless, something as real as, perhaps, a rainbow across the hills.

This first contact was a strong experience for both man and dog.  For even at the tender age of twelve weeks or so, the tiny dog appeared to sense that the human person holding him so longingly was deep in thought; far away in some remote place, almost trying to bridge a divide of many years.

Philip sat very carefully down on the wooden-slatted bench behind him so he could rest the beautiful animal in his lap.  The puppy was adorable.  Large, over-sized ears flopped across the top of a golden-brown furry head.  That golden-brown fur with countless black hairs intermingled within the tan flowed across the shoulders morphing into the predominantly cream colour of the pup’s soft, gangling front legs.  That creamy fur continuing along the little creature’s underbelly. The puppy Shepherd dog almost purred with contentment, his deep brown eyes gazing so intently into Philip’s deep blue eyes.  Puppy eyes starting to soften, maybe just a hint of eye-lids starting to close.

Philip had never before felt so close to an animal.  In a life time of more than fifty-nine years including cats at home when he was a young boy growing up in North-West London, and a pet cat when his own son and daughter were youngsters, Philip had never, ever sensed the stirrings of such a loving bond as he was sensing now.  As the young puppy seemed to be sensing in return.  This was going to be Philip’s dog, without a doubt.

“So, Sandra, tell me again what I need to know about raising a German Shepherd?”

Sandra Chambers, her grey hair turned up in a bun behind her head, brushed the dog hairs and the biscuit crumbs off her navy-blue overalls and sat down alongside Philip on the bench.  Sandra had seen hundreds of prospective owners over the more than forty years that she had been breeding German Shepherds up here on Devon’s Southern Dartmoor flanks.  But Philip was not typical of those hundreds of others.  First, he came on his own despite admitting that he was married.  Uncommon for a married couple not to chose a dog together. Then Philip, a good-looking, well-dressed, thoughtful man, that Sandra had guessed was in his late 50’s, had mentioned never previously owning a dog yet there was no question in his mind that this, his first dog, had to be a German Shepherd.  Sandra had counselled Philip that Shepherd dogs were wonderful, loyal companions but at the same time were incredibly strong animals; both physically and wilfully.  The commitment to properly and fully training a Shepherd dog was not to be underestimated.  A powerful, male Shepherd dog had the potential to kill a cat or a smaller dog in an instant, even to attack a stranger.  Training a dog such as this German Shepherd was without question.  Even more so in the case of the pup that Philip so fondly held as both the pup’s parents were from the very finest German bloodlines.

But despite Philip being such an unusual first owner, Sandra couldn’t miss the remarkable way that both Philip and the puppy had connected.

Sandra explained, “Well we’ve discussed his feeding needs, so that’s a big step.  At first just care and love him so he quickly registers that your home is his home.  Shepherds are very bright, very instinctive animals.  Just look at the way that he is watching your face just now!”

“Once you have him home, Philip, start into a routine in terms of potty training.  Let him out into your garden in his puppy harness so that he can sniff around.  As soon as he takes a pee or a dump reward him with kind words, a rub between his ears, even a small biscuit.  He will very quickly learn to potty outside.”

“You know I’m only a phone call away if you have any queries.”

Thus it was on a warm, sunny day in the first week of September, 2003 Philip drove the twenty miles from Sandra’s kennels in Bovey Tracey to his Harberton home just a few miles West of Totnes.  The little pup quiet as a mouse curled up on a blanket inside the puppy carrier placed on the passenger front seat; the passenger seat-belt around the front of the carrier; just in case!

Philip and his wife, Maggie, had anticipated that them getting a dog was more or less inevitable and the garden fencing around their village home had been double-checked.  Philip closed the wooden, five-bar gate behind him and drove the short distance up their gravel drive and parked the car.  He opened the passenger door and lifted the puppy carrier out and set it down on the warm grass.

A soft, wet nose lead the rest of a puppy’s body out of the carrier, cautiously sniffing and smelling the blades of grass. He padded across to a small tree, squatted and pee’d his first pee in his new home.

The front door opened and Maggie came down the front steps, slipping a beige jacket over her shoulders, brushing her long, blond hair back across the jacket as she did so and walked up to them.  “So you got him, then!”

She crouched down to be at the puppy’s level.  The dog, his eyes glistening with curiosity, came over to Maggie and sniffed her outstretched fingers.

“Oh, he is rather cute. Did you have difficulty choosing him?”

“No, not at all.  Sandra only had three puppies that were available just now and this little lad seemed to bond with me, and me with him, in a way that just wasn’t echoed with the other two puppies.”

“Plus, you know I always wanted a male Shepherd and the other pups were both females.”

Maggie stroked the young dog along his furry back. “What are we going to call him?”

Philip responded without hesitation. “Pharaoh.”

1140 words Copyright © 2013 Paul Handover