26 March 2018 - Bob

“Dogs’ lives are too short. Their only fault, really.”
                                                       Agnes Sligh Turnbull

“Such short little lives our pets have to spend with us, and they spend most of it waiting for us to come home each day.”
                                                      John Grogan

This week’s post offers a poem for all those who have lived with, loved, and lost a dog. You know who you are because once you have loved a dog there is no turning back. Unfeeling types may be so crass as to say, “Get over it. It was just a dog.” Such persons who use the pronoun, “it,” betray their shallow and uncompassionate natures. (Note: I’m leaving cats and other types of pets out of this exposition simply because the length of our posts does not permit enough space to do justice to our other sentient friends.) In addition to the “it” people, there are a few who actually mistreat dogs. This is one of the lowest levels a human being can sink to. And don’t even get me started on those hideous puppy mills that are rampant in the Midwest, and where puppies and their mothers suffer nothing short of criminal abuse.

I have loved and lived with dogs my entire life: mutts, Irish Setters, Shetland Sheep Dogs, and five German Shepherds. Currently, I have a female German Shepherd, who is my service dog. I am not alone. In the United States, 48% of households have a dog. In 2017 that amounts to somewhere in the neighborhood of 89.7 million dogs living in households as “pets,” although roughly 40% of dog owners consider their canines as family members.

The bond between humans and dogs has lasted thousands of years and has even shaped the way our brains have developed. Our canine companions affect us in a surprising number of ways, including boosting our immune systems and staving off dementia. With everything that dogs do for us, it’s no wonder they’ve been nicknamed “man’s best friend”.  

Bob, the subject of the poem below, was my service dog for ten years. This poem was written on the occasion of his death. More details reveal themselves in the poem, and in the “Background” that follows the poem.

Bob

On the blanketed floor

breath shallow, eyes closed

He waits for me to take him home

but I must help him go

both of us breathless hollow

The first needle pierces

he flinches       breath slows    paws relax

all suspended in this last

moment’s thread unraveling

one more breath                      another

eyes flicker open                                  shut

The second needle’s lethal head bites deep

the last act of a ten-year play

the final heartbeat sinks away

I take his body home   lay it on our bed

One last time I brush the black and white

kisses on his head

Breathing deep his scent I take a scissors

cut thick lock from behind his ear

bind it tight with gold as my heart twists in his hair

We carry him out under pines

Amid the lichens moss and stone

out under the void                   so far away from home

We lower him into a grave

clods sounding heavy on his sides and head

He disappears beneath the dirt                        gone

still here and somewhere                     else instead

Background:
If a dog is a person’s best friend, then a service dog is an extraordinary partner in life. Bob, a black-and-white Shetland Sheepdog (Sheltie), silently and without fanfare, served this writer 24/7 as her service dog for ten years, needing only to be close to the person he served. Bob died with dignity on 14 June 2016, lying on a soft blanket in his veterinarian’s office, making no sound nor fuss. He slipped silently away, in what might be called a death in service – serving his person’s deepest needs perfectly to the very end. This comes as no surprise, as one of Bob’s nicknames was Mr. Perfect. In his ten years of reliable service, Bob never made a mistake or failed to abide by all requisite canine duties and social graces, no matter how imperfect the human conduct or circumstances in which he served. Bob made people smile, although he was reserved, even aloof. Bob was polite to everyone and he opened hearts wherever he went.

We humans are blessed and cursed with the awareness of death, and when it comes to a partnership with a canine, we cannot truly understand how comparatively short that life and partnership will be. Considering why someone would invest so much time and heart into a temporally-challenged creature, someone once said, “A short life and certain death are not good reasons to pass up the chance to share such deep love and companionship.”

Exploration 1: What is your reaction to the following research-verified information?
The ability of dogs to read human gestures is remarkable. Even our closest relatives—chimpanzees and bonobos—can't read our gestures as readily as dogs can. Dogs are remarkably similar to human infants in the way they pay attention to us. This ability accounts for the extraordinary communication we have with our dogs. Some dogs are so attuned to their owners that they can read a gesture as subtle as a change in eye direction.

Exploration 2: How about this factual evidence?
Recently, a Japanese research team discovered that both humans and dogs release a hormone called oxytocin when they look into each other's eyes—the same hormone released when a human mother beholds her baby.

Exploration 3: If you dislike dogs and/or fear them, consider the origin(s) of these uncomfortable reactions.

Exploration 4: And this?
    A recent study conducted in Hungary suggests that dogs process language the same way that humans do, and that they are able to distinguish significant words from insignificant ones. Dogs are also able to recognize human faces both in photographs and in person, processing the images in the part of the brain that deals with communication, emotional expression, and storing memories.

Exploration 5: What is a dog? What relationships might/should/can they have with humans?

Woof Woof and A wooooo! Going out to all canines and their lovers,
Jack Pine Savage