A Friend of an Old Friend of Mine

Recently I reconnected with a highschool friend of mine who had not long ago adopted an abandoned pup.  She named him Leo. She was very excited about having her first dog, posted the news on FaceBook with his picture and wrote about some of his antics namely chewing up things that he had discovered and thought were toys.  There were some other issues namely the dog not being housebroken and crying all night when placed in his crate.  We corresponded via FB and agreed that some training was definately in order and so we played a couple rounds of telephone tag and finally got together to hammer out a day and time.  During the course of our conversation, my friend told me that Leo had chewed up her $300.00 pair of glasses for the second time.  She was as anyone would be very upset and now because she has "invested over $1500.00 in this dog-I'm not sure I want to keep him."  I got a call from her yesterday that she wanted to cancel our session for Sat because of all the expense that she has incurred already.  This is a clear case of an owner blaming the dog for his chewing issues.  She has talked about rehoming him, but that's not the answer either.  A dog should never be rehomed for destructive behavior.It is up to the owner to set the dog up for success in the first place.  DON'T LEAVE ITEMS THAT COULD BE THOUGHT OF BY THE DOG AS TOYS LYING AROUND WHERE THE DOG HAS ACCESS TO THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE.  Give your dog appropriate toys to play with and reward them with praise while they are playing with them.  If you know your dog will climb up onto a chair to get your glasses off your desk, tilt the chair toward the desk so that the seat is not in a position for the dog to climb onto it.  PUT YOUR SHOES,SLIPPERS,AND OTHER ITEMS OF CLOTHING AWAY AND OUT OF REACH FOR THE DOG TO DESTROY. I am really feeling bad about what my friend is going through because I know she loves Leo, but not investing in training him is a HUGE mistake!

Ten Years Later

     Today marks the 10th anniversary of that infamous day in our country that we have come to call 9/11.  There has been coverage in the news all of last week and of course the day of, the reliving of those awful moments of the day, but also of the days, weeks, and months that followed.  We all watched in horror and disbelief as the twin towers were hit by the planes that were hijacked by a group of thugs and murderers who prayed to "Allah" before they along with nearly 3000 other innocent people met their demise.  Two very different groups of people, one common and tragic end.
   Today I woke up thinking about all those innocent people who went to work that morning,who boarded those planes on that beautiful clear sunny day kissing their families goodbye and wishing them a good day.  I even think of them saying the same things to their dogs (and yes cats) as the dogs walk up to them as they walk out the door tails wagging and looking at their owners with that sweet doggie smile as if to say "I love you- see you soon." and then later that day the dogs are still waiting for their owners to come home....and they wait and wait and wait and wait....  We all heard stories of the heroic acts of rescue dogs in the days that followed- how they just wouldn't give up coming out of the rubble at Ground Zero until they had recovered either a body or something that had a human scent on it.  I can't help but think that the dogs who were around on 9/11 that may still be here what they must be feeling after all these years.  Dogs by nature are optimists and opportunistic and I can't help but think that they must be still in some way be waiting for their owners to come home.  It's difficult to explain these things to our youngsters, but for us who own dogs even though we don't have the capacity to explain this to them, they have the capacity to understand that somehting awful has happened and they get us through it with their sweetness and their capacity to love without prejudice.
A lot has been said about forgiveness today.  I think that we as a country have done that- not that we don't hold those responsible accountable for their actions, but we have moved on in the rebuilding of Ground Zero and celebrating it, but we will never forget the loss of life and innocence and the lonliness of our four legged friends who lost their people on that fateful day.