The Brown Dog Corps (and the honorary black dog)

The Brown Dog Corps (and the honorary black dog)
Left to right - Chuck, Mossy, Buddy, & Henna

Monday, February 1, 2010

Freedom At Last (Oso's Rescue - Day 14)

Today was your lucky day. It had been almost 14 days since we brought you home, and today you would finally be released from quarantine status. You were about to be sprung from house arrest, and you didn't even know it. If you had known, I wonder if you would have been quite so content in the covered kennel in your special corner of our living room. This morning you were dancing about and singing a whiny tune from the moment you saw me. But after i had taken you out to relieve yourself and fed you your breakfast, you settled down and contently watched the activities of the house from your special corner, that by now had now been dubbed 'Oso's corner of the world'.

I had been thinking about this day all weekend long, and rushed through breakfast and a few morning chores. The day was decent for the time of year. It was a balmy 54 degrees outside; unusually warm for the first day of February. The sky was overcast in traditional Northwest early spring fashion, high cloud cover with sporadic rainy sprinkles every now and again. I was able to stay plenty warm with a t-shirt and a zip-up fleece jacket. In the back of my mind, I was thinking that it was warm enough that we could spend a good long time outdoors today without you getting too cold. After all, you had spent the last 14 days in a cozy warm kennel directly across the room from the warmth of a pellet stove. The stove sat on a river rock hearth in a corner of the living room. Mossy's favorite cedar bed was positioned at the base of the hearth. You could easily see her from your kennel. She would lay, curled up on her bed for hours at a time in the evening, rather impervious to the activities around her after a long day of play in the great outdoors. You would know that type of tranquil rest tonight!

When we headed out the door for the first time, it was just you and I. The other dogs were left in the house leaving us some one on one time to practice a few recalls with the whistle and basically get the ants out of your pants during your first hour of freedom. As we walked toward the upper pond I was met with disappointment. Over the last 4 days, the water had seeped back into the earth and left only a large, muddy, puddle in it's place. Darn! I was so hoping that we could have tried to see if you might swim. I silently wished it would rain again so the dogs would have water to play in. Our largest pond is the lower pond. When full it was nearly 10' deep on one end. This made for excellent swimming opportunities for the Labs. The problem was that once it stopped raining, they quickly emptied; seeping into the ground.

I tossed the bumper across the puddle. It landed in a thick area of mud, and was barely visible. You struggled to find the now camouflaged toy, and skeptically nosed along the edges of the pond. You even stepped on the bumper once without noticing. Finally, a few minutes later you were able to locate your prize. You snatched it right up and came running toward me with wild abandon. The purple rope, that was used for throwing, on the end of the bumper was dripping in muck. As you dashed by me, brushing my leg, my clean and dry jeans were now slathered in mud. I peered down to see a clump of overly slimy mud fall from the side of me thigh, and made a sour face. "Gross", I whispered.


I called you to me, and was pleasantly surprised when you returned right away. We had practiced this many times during our on-leash potty breaks during the last two weeks, but this was really the first time I had tried it with you off leash. You executed it beautifully. Yes! The next hurdle was to see if you would actually give me back the bumper. The first time I tried to take it from you, I was met with a little resistance. But after a few seconds your teeth chattered as you reluctantly handed it over. Yes! I tossed it immediately again. I wanted to remind you that if you gave me back the bumper we could play again; because this is a fun game.

We spent almost half an hour wandering about the property. Sometimes I'd let you run a
round freely, carrying the bumper in your mouth. And when you would come back to me on your own, I would toss the bumper again. You explored the now dry river bed, stepped carefully along the edges of the ponds, sniffed foliage, and rooted under the straw that covered the old logging roads that ran parallel to the ponds.

You were filthy! In a matter of minutes you were covered in dirt and mud. The thick slime that coated the pink of your jowls had dribbled out. And as you ran, jumped, and played strings of it lay across your nose and the top of your head. This has to be a boy thing. Buddy, my 3 year old rescue, is the only male dog I have ever had. The first time he rubbed against me and left a trail of slime that ran up the sleeve of my sweatshirt and stretched across the front, I winced in repulsiveness. I had never seen anything like it. It looked like an army of slugs had just got their marching orders, and they took a direct route across my clothes. Although I have grown used to the 'ick' factor, I am forever grabbing the nearest towel to catch 3-foot long shoestrings from hitting the floor and wiping remaining drool from the bottom of his chin. Forget worrying about
being jumped on when you are greeted at the front door of my house. Instead the focus is to stave off the potential sliming of our guests pant legs.

Reluctant to have to hose you down, I decided to take you on a walk to the nearby lake. Although
the lake is only a few hundred yards from our house, technically it is private. It is a large manmade lake, that belongs to the community of home owners that surround it. On the end
nearest my house is a large grassy area with a picnic table and several benches. From time to time I have taken one or two of the dogs over for a swim. But usually during the day, when fewer people are at home, and never with more dogs so as not to draw too much attention. It is a wonderful swimming spot, and so far our visits there have been uneventful.

We walked through the woods, and you carried your bumper most the way. I had to push some branches aside as I walked. You would sometimes stop and give me a dubious look. The path was perfectly passible for a pup your size, but needed a bit of ducking and brush beating for me to get by. I made a mental note to bring some clippers with me the next time we walked this trail so I could do a bit of trail maintenance. You loved the path through the woods, and bounded happily along.

When we reached the grassy beach area, you carefully tiptoed along the shore; balancing between grass and water. I had discerned that you had never swam before the accidental dip you had in the pond the day after I brought you home. I tossed the bumper parallel to the shore, and only a foot or two into the water. You cautiously retrieved it every time. As you became more brave I began to toss the bumper a little farther from short each time. First three feet, then five, and then about twelve feet. I had accidentally thrown it too far, and you weren't quite that brave. You waded into the water, gradually walking out deeper and deeper until your chest was in the water. I had watched you do this a few times during each of your last retrieves. As soon as you couldn't possibly go any deeper without floating, you would start to paddle. At first your paddling was sloppy and inefficient, but each time it got a little better. Eventually you started to swim more horizontal and toward the bumper. But this time, you gave up before reaching it. I was worried that I had worn out our luck.
I tried tossing some rocks at the bumper, and stood by you on the edge of the lake with words of encouragement. Your sqeaking and intense focus let me know that you truly had the drive and the want for the bumper. But your newly acquired swimming abilities, and confidence were holding you back. I stepped into the water with my black rubber boots and encouraged you again. You waded in a little faster and began to swim for it. By this time it had floated almost 20 feet from shore, and again you turned around before reaching your prize. You were disappointed. I could tell that you wanted it so bad, and just couldn't muster up quite enough courage to go for it. I had resigned to the fact that I was going to have to come back a little later with another dog to retrieve my $5.00 bumper. I buy them in bulk, but still hate to loose a single one.

With your interest finally waning, you retrieved a stick from the shoreline and brought it to me. I tossed it out in the water about five feet, and decided that one short water retrieve would be a nice positive note to end on after losing our bumper. You quickly waded in and swam toward the stick. Still splashing and swimming not-so-effectively, you managed to sink the stick with your front feet. You glanced around, searching for your stick, and gave up. But instead of returning to the shore you made a quick adjustment and headed straight out to the bumper, still floating about 25 feet from shore. I silently watched from shore as you sucessfully grabbed the bumper. "YES", I hollered, "Yes! That's a gooooood boy!" And with that, we ended your first ever successful swim.
We blasted back down the path toward home. I was excited to tell Chris about your swimming adventure. You and the other dogs spent the afternoon hanging out with me as I took turns working in the yard and watching all five labradors interact and play. Although you struggled to keep up with their games of chase, I knew that it would just be a matter of time before you gained stamina and strength. You followed me around and watched intently as I scooped a few days worth of dog poop. I cursed myself for not scooping the grassy areas around the house over the last several days. I had been working many extra shifts at the hospital, and no one was home in time to do the chore before it was too dark outside. If there's something I've learned about this chores, it is that in a multiple dog household, one should never scoop poop in the dark.

A few hours later, a glance at my happy pack of Labs, I realized that bath time was pretty much inevitable. I hemmed and hawed, and begrudgingly headed in for a stack of towels. I simply MUST work on getting a warm water spigot outside! The water from the hose is just too cold on my aging hands, and I have found it more and more difficult to make them work once they begin to turn blue. In a rash decision, I decided that I was simply not in the mood to freeze my hands. I talked Chris into walking with me over to the lake. I decided it was early enough in the day that if we could sneak in in stealth mode, keep all the dogs at a heal until we reached the lake, toss in a stick two or three times, and get out; no one would ever notice.

Chris picked up a couple of sticks on the trail tossed them in when we got to the lake. All the dogs dove right in. Good bye dirt and mud. And, after a time or two, much to our surprise, so did you! We quickly made our escape, and hiked back down the trail to the house. Systematically I dried everyone off, and Chris helped to put them in the house one at a time. You loved being dried off with a towel. You leaned into me, and stretched out as I dried off your neck, head, and ears.

Once inside I decided to let you roam free for a bit. I had everyone's attention as I opened a few pieces of string cheese and started to break them into pieces. You were quick to follow suit when I asked everyone to sit, before I would dole out a single piece of cheese. You took your thimble-sized piece of cheese gently with your lips. Now that you are not so hungry, I have noticed that you are much more gentle with your food.

After your snack, I cleaned out your kennel. You had been busy this weekend. For the first time you showed signs of destructive behavior. You pulled strips of blanket from the ends of the Woolrich blanket that had been in my family for a generation. I winced at the damage and scolded myself for being naive enough to put that particular blanket in your kennel. Shame on me! This time, I instead gave you a smaller fleece blanket. Although, you tend to bunch it up in the back corner of your kennel during the moments of the kennel gymnastics that you seem to be so good at.

Unwillingly, you dawdled into your kennel. But once I closed the door, you flopped down on your blanket and laid your head down. In a couple of hours Chris would feed you, and then I was pretty certain that you would go right back to sleep. You thoroughly enjoyed your freedom, and now you were going to thoroughly enjoy your rest. I headed to town for some errands. When I was there I had planned on picking up a cotton rug for the bottom of your kennel. Maybe that would be a little less appealing to eat, and would stay put even after your gymnastics.


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