Dog Tales

I have a theory about dogs.  Want to hear it?  Well, you must or you wouldn't be here.  And if you don't, that's too bad because here it is:

You only get to own one really good dog in your life.

There, I said it.  Dispute it if you will, but that's my belief based on a not-so-random sampling of people I know who own dogs.  My experience is that it's usually your first dog.  Maybe because it's like your first kid:  they somehow know you don't know what you're doing so they tend to be a little more understanding.  By the second dog, you know what to expect and what you want in a dog and are less tolerant of stuff. 

And to clarify:  I generally find that it's the first dog you own as an adult.  I had some really good dogs as a kid: Holly and Bill, specifically.  But they were both the first dogs owned by my parents.  Holly was my mom and Kim's dog, Bill my dad and Nancy's.  Good dogs.  And I loved them.  But they weren't MY dogs. 

My dogs were Abby, Sophie, Tiyo, Murphy, Dibbs and now Gracie. 

Abby was the chosen dog.  Mitch took 30 days leave from the Navy when we got Abby as a 12-week-old Newfoundland puppy.  (Please note: He took 4 days off when Jacob was born.  Our firstborn child.  FOUR DAYS.)  Abby didn't drool, she was smart, obedient, and other than the mounds of black fur she left everywhere, perfect.  She loved kids and was great with them.  My kids crawled on her, pulled themselves up by grabbing her ears and pretended to ride her.  She died at 10, which is really old for a Newfoundland, of arthritis.  She rarely barked, didn't get on the couch, and only slept on the bed when invited.  She didn't try to eat the cats.  Really good dog.

Sophie was a Newfoundland puppy we only had for 3 weeks.  We sent her back to the breeder because she had a birth defect.  But even in those 3 weeks, she was completely different.  She was stubborn.  She refused to walk on a leash and Mitch spent those 3 weeks dragging her through the grass in the backyard by the leash.  She had a bladder problem that was the result of poor breeding.  (Always check your breeders folks, the good ones aren't in it for the money.)

Tiyo we got when he was 2 years old.  Also a Newfoundland and big as a house.  And DUMB as a STUMP.  God help us, that dog was dumb.  The only living Newfoundland who was afraid of water.  He would walk AROUND puddles.  When we took him and Abby to the lake, he would wade in to his dog ankles and stand there, shaking and drooling, while Abby swam and swam for hours.  He drooled like crazy anytime someone different would come into the house.  We had to keep old towels around to clean up the drool.  He was a farm dog and when we got him, he had never seen stairs.  His technique was to go down them as fast as possible.  I always said I'd find him at the bottom of the stairs with a broken neck one day, or in the tub drowned in an inch of water. He died at 12, when we had to have him put down.  No one told him Newfoundlands don't live to be 12.

Then there was Murphy.  A good dog candidate, except for his pesky habit of biting kids faces.  He would have been good if he had had a better puppyhood, I just know it. 

Dibbs was my nephew Joe's dog, who we fostered when Joe went into the Air Force.  And Joe would probably say he was a good dog.  But he wasn't really our dog - we only had him for a few months before he went to visit his grandmother for a holiday and just never came home.   Lisa needed him more than we did, and she was definitely due a good dog after Riley, the wild beast.  Dibbs was goofy looking and had a tiny little head stuck on his fat body.  He reminded me of Yoda and whenever I pretended he was talking, it always came out in Yoda-speak.  "My head to small for my body it is" and stuff like that. 

And now Gracie.  I don't know what it is about this dog that drives me crazy.  Maybe it's her habit of jumping up on the couch, even though she knows she's not allowed.  Maybe it's her favorite game: unrolling the toilet paper.  Or her other favorite game: taking tissues out of the box on the end table.  She's starting to grow on me some, but she's got a look in her eye that tells me it's going to be a long road.  I like my dogs big and lazy and this one is not there yet.  Once we get past this puppy stage, I think we'll turn a corner.  Let's hope so anyway. 

But I still stand by my theory.  One really good dog in your lifetime.  Once you have that really good dog, the others might not quite measure up.  Sure, I loved all those other dogs - especially Murphy, in spite of his obvious flaws - because they were all good dogs in their own ways.  Tiyo was a good dog, so was Dibbs and so is Gracie.  But really good dogs?

Those are hard to find.