Ramblings About Dogs

Good Morning My Confidants

It's Monday and I'm grateful for coffee. I'm also grateful for those of you who read my daily morning rambling, often written before I'm fully awake.

My morning ramblings have changed my life. It all started when I was trying to pull myself out of my dark time, and pull myself out I did. By starting my morning with quiet, sometimes cuddling dogs, for a long while I was reading daily readers (and I kind of want to go back to that), and really clearing out my mind, clearing out my heart, making peace, looking for things to be grateful for, and absolutely not watching the news before noon.

For the most part I still do that last one.

I know so many people that the first thing they do when they come downstairs just turn on CNN or the equivalent and start their day jammed with a horrors of what's going on in the world, because news stations like that deliver what sells, and what sells is disaster.

What I can find on social media, what I've managed to get on to my feed, are all kinds of wonderful stories. This morning on Dodo there was something about a crane that had started tapping on this family's patio door every morning. It didn't seem to want food or anything, just for some reason to say hello. And he kept coming back, every single morning, and then one day he brought his mate, and then children. A few years down one of the birds that have left the nest showed up with his mate. The lady who did the video said she was so grateful that these birds have chosen her, and isn't it utterly amazing? So incredible! And we so underestimate animals.

I love animals so much, although my tip top favorite is dogs. They were The accidental genetic experiment that has gone on for thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of years, some theorize back to the caveman days. Or at least the very very earliest settlements. Although there's evidence for the former. Because dogs are not wolves more and more were discovering that the Dog Whisperer is wrong, in his statements never rang true for me.

Cats chose to be domesticated, and they're really not. Dogs only sort of chose to be domesticated. The running theory, and there's tons and tons of evidence of this, is that there would be the occasional wolf that would be okay being around people. They've discovered it's a genetic trait that is linked with a few other traits. So say, a wolf would actually stay around people. I suppose something like Socks in the movie "Dances with Wolves." And given time the tribe would gain a few more of these wolves. And these wolves would mate with the other wolves that wanted to be around humans. And then they're litters, most of the pups would leave to go be with wolves, but if you would be like their parents who would want to be around humans. And after generations and generations and generations of them breeding with wolves that wanted to be around people, they genetically began to change because of those traits that link with a trait of wanting to be around humans. Wolves, for instance, carry their tail low. While dogs like to lift them high, and wave them. Wolves don't wag their tail. Another trait is that they really depend on humans. Very much emotionally.

And that's why it's so very critically important that if someone is going to take on a dog, they do it for life. The dog does not understand when a human gets tired of them. Our dog Aspen has been with us for some time now, closing in on two years, and she's still a little bit messed up. I think there's this little part of her that looks for her old people.

However, something powerful has happened with her. It happened last night during the thunderstorm. She's only the second dog we've ever had that doesn't like them, and the first one was because he was a puppy mill dog and had apparently been left out in all kinds of weather his whole life. Never been comforted through a thunderstorm. We got him as a rescued elder dog it was at least 12 years old.

Anyway, Aspen, turned out to be terrified of them and I had to ask what to do. She was shaking and panting it was scaring me. So, I was advised to wrap her real tight in a cloth, I used a towel, and a holder very close. I actually took her upstairs in a dark room and got in under some blankets and she burrowed in tight, face smooshed into my armpit, and finally went to sleep.

In many ways she's sort of become RBear's dog, but at the first rumble of thunder she comes right to me. She did it last night. She was sitting on the other couch, I was sitting where I always do, and with the first rumble she jumped up came to me and huddled in close. We have since that first incident gotten her a thunder jacket by the way, and we put that on her too. She stayed with me all evening, through the hard rain, and the gentle rain, and when I went to bed dug in close there as well. Sometime in the night it all calm down and she went down to her normal place at the foot of the bed.

But when she's scared she came to me. That's powerful. She trusts me. And if I were to give her away, what would that do to that trust? I took on a responsibility when I took on this dog, and it's more than a responsibility. I'm her shepherd. I'm her caretaker. That is the relationship humans have with dogs.

I understand that sometimes there are those things that come up in life where a person has to give up a dog. For goodness sakes, people die. So I will not speak an absolutes.

But please please please, do not take on a dog unless you plan on doing it till their last day, and be holding them when they slip from this world. Even if it is painful. Because they're terrified. And you give them strength.

And you know what? My dogs give me strength. So much.

And so..... Today is morning rambling turned out to be about dogs. Not surprising considering the thunderstorm yesterday. And the fact that RBear thought it necessary to bug bomb the house. I don't think it was, I haven't seen a single bug other than the occasional house spider, but the three of us have learned to trust each other and I went along with it. What it meant was that we had to leave for four hours and we had to take the dogs. It was an unseasonable 88° and humid, and with all the weight that I gained, I don't deal as well with the heat as I normally do. So that four and half hours took a lot out of me, and they were taken into places but they've never been taken into before and it made them a little anxious. We found out that you can take dogs into Half Price Books! Who would have known?

But it was one more case of bonding with our animals, our sweet and trusting creatures. Today they and I am exhausted. But it's the good kind. I sit here in my nest, the front door open, the birds a lovely chorus outside serenading me. Willow is close. The coffee is good. Noah has left for work. RBear stayed up late late doing stuff that needs to be done in the attic, so I won't see him for hours. So it's me, the dogs, and anyone who's actually read this far.

For those who have I give you my blessings. I wish you all the love in the world. I wish you something like the doggies that trust and love me so, and whom I trust and love with all my heart.

I wish you a most excellent week, one filled with blessings, and perhaps something wonderfully life-changing.

Remember that you are a very special and unique creation of the Universe, there is only one of you, no one else like you, and that you are here to be all that you can be, a very special blessing to the world.

Love, love, love,

Namasté,

BG "Gentle Ben" Thomas