It’s always a bit challenging to get everyone in and settled into their meals, especially given their exuberance in the matter. A few months ago, in order to solve the problem of them crowding the back door and trampling me to smithereens in order to get to their food, I began going outside with them and calming them a bit, with a brief search and rescue exercise.
Our oldest pup is blind, deaf, skittery and just plain pitiful. Of course, she’s very sweet and this one endearing factor outweighs just about all the others. She camps out on an old lawn chair in the back yard and dozes most of the day. Since it takes an extraordinary amount of time and effort to get her attention every night, I decided to teach my other two pooches to go get her for me. I figured that if every night was going to be a canine ‘silver alert’, I should have some help.
Our Trixie, who we have had the longest of our current three, is the smartest dog I have ever known. She is, if any dog is, capable of going out and getting our little old lady and herding her in. After all, she is a cattle herder, so it’s not a big stretch.
Kobe, our pug, is the smallest and quite possibly the only dog I’ve ever met with severe ADHD. He’s game for an adventure, but has very little ability to contribute beyond being cute and scampering about giving shrill and yippy encouragement to his big sister.
Together, they would, ideally, go into the back yard and get our Annie, or so I hoped.
Devoutly to be wished.
Instead, after three weeks trying out my new scheme, I gave up. I have to go out back myself, accompanied by my happy pooches, get our little old lady’s attention and get all three dogs headed in the same direction. Considering their species, it’s remarkably like herding cats.
Anyway, I get myself to the head of the line, and before I let them into the kitchen, I make them all sit. What this can be described as is me yelling ‘SIT!’ to one bouncy, yippy dog who is not listening at all; to one large and waggley dog trying hard to be patient; and to one dog facing the other direction and barking at the wall.
When I finally got them (all but one, of course; she just can’t help it) sitting and making eye contact, I opened the kitchen door. My wagglies all stayed put, for a second anyway. They then proceeded to knock me down, and zoom about.
I tried to make a grab for the over-zealous pug, slipped and over turned my ankle, and was stepped on in every single vulnerable spot by my big, heavy girl, too hungry now, to stop.
Annie kept barking at the wall.
I caught the pug by his hind quarters, trying hard to act quickly, before the pain from my ankle set in. He yelped, made a worthy attempt to bend completely in half to bite me, but gave in when I added a little rubbing into my steel grasp, to confuse him into thinking that I was giving him a little love. It worked.
Trixie, realizing belatedly, I guess, that I was hurt and that she was probably responsible (and seeing that I hadn’t put food into her bowl yet,) swooped back and delivered nurturing and gloppy licks, just to help of course.
Annie was now up on her hind legs, scrabbling at the opposite wall, trying to get in, where there is no door.
Finally, I was able to hobble up on one foot, scooping the pug up with me. I got him into his crate with a nice bowl of food and fresh clean water. I gave Trixie her food, for which she showed her great thanks, by diving into it.
Finally, free of the other two, I gently nudged Annie 180 degrees, so she could at least, I hope, see the blurry light of our kitchen and get her bearings.
With all three dogs fed and bedded, I nursed my poor ankle.
Sometimes having dogs is exhausting!
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