There's Just Somethin' Women Like About a Pick-up Man.

 (RIP Joe Diffie, 2020, due to COVID-19)

Well, MacShane and I had another walk the other day. He got a little fired up about the squirrels who are twitterpated and running around tail-flipping at each other all over our block. Nothing I couldn't handle, and we crossed the street beautifully just before a pick up truck paused at the same intersection. 

"Oh, it's just a pick up. We'll be fine," I thought. 

It was diesel.

Shows what I get for thinking. 

But really, in spite of all the hiccups I run into with MacShane, things have gone well. I had an online training consult with someone who works from a slightly different style than mine, and he was very helpful at getting me to slow down and give MacShane more time with fewer expectations. 

Which got me thinking about MacGyver. 

MacGyver gets very little time outside of the house and yard. He's just TOO fired up by everything.

But after that Zoom session, I thought I'd risk something, and after MacShane got in from one of his "Get the Jitters Out" walks before work, I shuffled dogs (some days it's like a Dog Bite Three Card Monty in our house) and got the Harness Lead I use at the shelter on his chonky butt. Using the same things I had to be reminded of for MacShane, MacGyver manages the same route every day, usually at least as well as MacShane, often more since he cares less about the squirrels and has no real issues with vehicles. He does, if the opportunity presents itself, attempt to eat cat poop. 

Since it's not attempting to eat actual cats, I'll live with it for now.

And what about McKie? Well, we're working on it. Sometimes The Guy will fling a lead on him and take him with, but often he doesn't. The old dog is on some new meds, but when it's cold out or if he's been rowdy with MacGyver in the yard, we don't push it. There's more sugar on that big black muzzle than he had just a year ago, and it's a fine line to walk between 'enough' and 'too much' some days. MacGyver certainly doesn't have the kind of self-control it takes to stop before he gets lame in his back end (both legs, one the knee, one the hip). It's tough on the old pup to realize he's not the lizard chasing champion of the desert like he used to be.

Hard on the Guy to admit it, too. We're all just doing the best we can. 

I don't know how I'm going to put the Guy back together when McKie goes to hang out at the Rainbow Bridge. A significant part of his life will be gone, and he's already had too many sudden, traumatic, or hard losses, some that no child should have to handle. We'll deal with it together, no questions about that, but... how? Our every waking moment, in one way or another, involves these dogs, the leopard gecko in the living room window, and my cat up in her princess tower. And watching that big brindle weenie hobble around during this last cold snap has made me realize how short the time we have might really be. So when he says "No, I just want to nap," I don't push it. And if he only hikes his leg and pees off the deck instead of going down into the grass, I don't worry about it too much either. At least he's still going outside to do his business.

But when he can't... 

Harder on me mentally, I think, than wondering how I'd pry 70 or 80 pounds of dog off a neighbor is how I'd hike that same weight up and down a flight of stairs, or into a car, with a bum knee, a bad back, and a bad temper. 

Sometimes I really do see the logic behind some peoples' dedication to toy poodles, Beagles, or mini Schnauzers. (Well, maybe not those last ones, unless they don't get a talker.) Even near my death bed I should still be able to pick up an Italian Greyhound.

But probably not even the back end of an Akita, or a pit bull. So, I guess I've gotta go walk my dogs, and we'll keep taking care of each other as much as we can, including remembering that if a truck has rear dualies and a smoke stack, it's probably also diesel. 

When You Go, All I Know is You're My Favorite Mistake

I feel the need to muse on "Whoops". Not the last entry, but the concept in general. 

"Whoops" means taking responsibility for the previous unwanted or unexpected circumstance, but in a light-hearted, not-so-serious way. It's interchangeable with dozens of other interjections. "Crap", "Nuts", "Fudge", "Shoot!", "Darn it!", the urban export "My bad!", or the perpetual Canadian "Sorry!" 

So why did I call that walk where so much out of my control sprang out at us a "Whoops"? 

Well, ultimately, it's all my fault. MacShane would never get out of this house without extreme measures if I didn't reach for a doorknob. (Thankfully I don't think any of these three hooligans can figure out how to work the old-fashioned brass knobs on a 100 year old house's door, but only because they're rounded-off. Lever-style latches? Forget it! We'd never have them in the house.) 

So I put a leash on him and I took him down a city street where, while it's usually quiet, at any minute, any number of things could literally appear out of nowhere. Doing these things means I leave him vulnerable every time we go out that door into an area I can't lock or otherwise shut down. And after the life he’s had, why in the Richard Nixon’s Favorite Word should he trust me? Our only options once we're on the sidewalk are to endure or flee, and I'm a Clydesdale, not a thoroughbred, built for hard work and endurance, not speed. He? Is nimble as a deer and faster than a polecat up a pine tree.

I know this, now, because yesterday, we had another "whoops". Two of them, really, but only one truly worried me. 

The first moment of struggle made me take a turn we usually don't, and caused the second indirectly. A neighbor one block over who walks a large shaggy white mixed breed dog on a prong collar was following us. Now, I've mentioned before that I have very firm and science-backed positions on the equipment and methods used to handle dogs. We're closing in on one of them, so brace for links. 

When the very political Humane Society of the United States publishes the following live on their website, I feel like I'm not just being reactionary about the practice because it 'looks mean'. 

"Aversive collars, or collars that rely on physical discomfort or even pain to teach a dog what not to do, are not a humane option. While they may suppress the unwanted behavior, they don't teach the dog what the proper behavior is and they can create anxiety and fear, which can lead to aggression. Positive reinforcement training methods—ones that use rewards—are more effective and strengthen the relationship between you and your dog."

So to set the scene, I have a 70#, dog friendly but stranger averse dog on the sidewalk two blocks from our home, walking around on a harness while still adjusting to what I think I've counted is the 8th or 9th major traumatic change or separation in his life. I do my best to keep us at least 40' away from the things I know to be his major triggers, which include white vehicles, diesel engine vehicles, strangers, small children, other domestic animals and wildlife, and loud noises like gunshots. (And I live in South St. Louis, where getting drunk and firing your gun in the air is apparently the only way to celebrate anything. This summer is going to get interesting, or we're renting a big RV and driving into the boonies to listen to the tree frogs instead of the 308s.) 

If I can't get far enough away from the trigger fast enough, we start doing tricks on the side of the road, assuming he's not already so focused on the potential exciting or scary thing that I can't get his attention any more. I'm not showing off at that point; I'm trying to keep the dog from biting me or pulling out of my grip and hurting someone because he gets too scared to be Him instead of a cornered carnivore.

This neighbor and his big white fluffy dog, twice now, have decided to follow us on our walk, guy talking to the dog the way I talk to our dogs inside the house. Normally happy baby talk means happy dog, right? Not in this case. The dog's body language is cautious and avoidant. (What do I mean by that? Well, here are some examples.) The guy sounds like he’s having a grand ol’ time, but I don’t see a single reward come to the dog, just lots of baby talk and movement.

To take it one step further, the even bolder San Francisco SPCA picks apart the usual arguments for using control devices instead of teaching on their website. Thyroid glands and tracheas are pretty important for the lifetime of the dog. Like, even if you find a vet that will hack off your dog's ears and tail, they won't remove *those* parts. Seems best to preserve them, right? 

Realistically, if something "looks mean" that's probably because it *is*. But besides the inability to read his dog, this neighbor guy doesn't know "how to properly use" the device he's decided to make his dog interact with to get any kind of stimulation outside of their little bungalow and tiny fenced yard-- a dog that appears to be the most recent in a long lineage of large, white fluffy dogs that were bred to wander acre after acre of pastureland keeping track of hoofstock, with the ability to kill coyotes or a small wolf if needed. 

My neighbor, like many other well-meaning people, has turned a herding or guarding machine thousands of years in development into a couch ornament with no actual *job*. A government does not train military snipers and then expect them to sit on a sunny back porch killing flies by throwing toothpicks. And yet, here is a herding or working breed of dog walking in quarter mile circles in a city being stabbed in the neck at random for daring to not walk at the turtle's pace set by the human with a length of nylon in his hand. 

The dog has the choice of, essentially, solitary confinement, or walk in the same boring circle once or twice a day doing everything in his power not to inconvenience the human with the metal thing by looking up at the wrong moment. But even further complicating the issue: the "self-correcting" collar is merely slung on the dog and clipped to a leash, thus it fits in such a way that the dog is going to wiggle out of it one day, if he doesn't just jerk his neck out of joint. I hope I'm not on the block the day that happens, and ditto for the guy with two retired racing greyhounds that finishes their loop of the neighborhood just before we start ours, or the lady with the little fluffy blonde thing that heads out after we're already home. If I do happen to be around when that happens, I'll be tossing a slip lead on his dog and walking it to his fence myself while having a frank talk about what I've seen, where I work, and the kind of help he's likely to need.

In watching our distance from this dog, I've never seen it walk with the tail in a normal or elevated position. I've never seen its ears up. I've never seen it allowed to pause and sniff a spot as long as it wants to. The dog is perpetually curled about thirty degrees away from the human regardless of what they're doing. 

The guy may not feel like he's done anything athletic or exerting when he gets back to his house with his dog and probably thinks it was a good trip, but the dog clearly feels out of sorts about something, and one day that's all going to fall apart. I don't need it falling apart while I have a dog with me who will protect that clearly uncomfortable dog from his or her own owner because MacShane or McKie suss out faster than the human that the reason the dog is uncomfortable is the human with the leash. 

Remember, my two big guys have over half a dozen bites to humans between them. A dog that uses force on humans successfully once will absolutely do it again if they feel the need.

In the meantime, thanks to being followed around the block like a lost goat twice, I've ordered a bright red hoodie that essentially says "We're training, go away." If I can find a silk screening company in STL that will do it, I may have something sarcastic custom made too. 

I may also slip a note in the Prong Collar Guy's mailbox asking him to please not follow if he sees us changing direction and zig-zagging to stay away from him, but I'm not sure how to word it so that we won't be reported to the Citizens Services Bureau for being "dangerous" simply because we don't care to be followed in public. I suppose that's all my fault too, though; we're a woman alone and a beautiful, friendly-looking dog. How dare we exist without a male chaperone or open carry permit! /sarcasm 

So, as a quick PSA: the best thing others can do when they see someone walking with a dog go off the path and start practicing sit and down all of a sudden is to give them more space. Apparently most people don't know that, or what a yellow ribbon on the leash means. 

This guy decided twice now to follow us with a minimally secured dog, even when I obviously looked right at them, cued MacShane to “cross”, and sped up to move away. Whoops! Guess I need to take my mace, a knife, and a break stick now too, just in case, since I am responsible for keeping MacShane away from all the hazards I possibly can when we’re out and about. 

My next step is to decide how much responsibility for chaos and fear I’m willing to take on. Where does my comfort with “Whoops” end and these walks become exercises in futility, or flat-out dangerous?

Our second “Whoops” actually led to a net positive, once we got off of the block where the Guy with the Prong Collar lives. Unfortunately it involved upsetting the barrier reactive collie two blocks down and the fat chihuahua three houses away from the collie. In our zig-zags to avoid the Guy with the Prong Collar, we went down a side street, really more of an alley, with tall yards on both sides too steep for me to walk into. The left side lawn is nearly vertical to 3’ off the sidewalk, and again, I’m a Clydesdale, not a thoroughbred. I didn’t think even Francis the Talking Mule could coonjump into this yard!

So of course, that’s the stretch we’re walking when traffic appears, a white SUV. Now, large white vehicles are a Bad Thing to MacShane, so I had options, but had to choose in seconds: 

1. Make a run for it, piss off the fat chihuahua even more, and turn seeing a big white vehicle into getting chased by a big white vehicle (again?).

2. Try to turn around and go back the other way, passing the scary white vehicle, but for a briefer period of time.

3. Get out treats and hope.

Option 3 was the most expedient. 

“Park it?” I asked, and patted a patch of green grass about 3’ higher than my feet were planted. He bounced right to it and sat, ears down and panting slightly more than he likely should have been, but making eye contact, clearly looking for instructions. 

We were eye to eye when the SUV went around us. I rewarded him with some liver at a rate of one bite per second, with plenty of “Yes, good, Yes, good, Yes, good.” until the vehicle was past. As the dust cleared, I checked our three o’clock, then nine, then six. 

“Okay, let’s go,” and MacShane was off the lawn wiggling at the foaming chihuahua that was levitating off the ground higher and higher with each “YAP!” but thankfully will never be able to get over that fence without a trampoline and an infusion of helium.

I thought we’d make it home safely after that. Shows what I get for thinking. 

The next vehicle wasn’t white. It was maroon. It needed an exhaust overhaul in 2018 by the sound of it, and a new catalytic converter by the smell of it. The driver gave not a fart in the wind that we had no sidewalk to get to and blew past us like his tail pipe was on fire, not just full of holes. 

Welcome to St. Louis drivers, who don’t give a single damn about anything that isn't getting where they want to be right now and slow downs are always the other guy's fault.

MacShane lurched to the end of the leash, cursing out the driver, spittle flying, before I could attempt to cue “park it” again, but once the van was far enough away “park it” on a grassy spot worked a second time. Whew!

Again, I thought we’d make it home okay after that. I should learn to stop thinking. 

The landlord’s cat Panther was out on her porch. No helping it, I had to resort to distracting him by letting him get close enough to our car that he thought we’d go for a ride and give Panther time to slink away to safety.

It was, in some ways, the walk from Hell, but at least I didn’t swear at a sanitation engineer this time. Whoops!

We Didn't Start the Fire...

MacShane is the big red dog. He's got a real problem with diesel powered vehicles, big white vans and trucks, and a well-developed sense of prey drive. And who can blame him, really, when squirrels are just tennis balls thrown by the gods. (Pick one, or more, they're all welcome with me!) 

About four days ago, now, we were out for the "get the jitters out" trip we take before the humans go to work and had what I'm euphemistically calling a "whoops". 

I had to take a day or two to calm down from it. I was... nah, no nicer way to say it, I was pissed, and not at MacShane. None of any of the last eight years of chaos, fear, confusion, and frightening reactions have been his fault. 

He's a dog for cryin' out loud. Dog's gonna dog. 

Anyway, we were out walking, like we do, my head on a swivel and making course corrections to avoid squirrels, cats, kids, other humans, and big white vans and trucks, but still finding all the leaf piles full of hidden gumballs to sniff around in, when what comes lumbering down our narrow little one-way street... but a garbage truck. 

Where were we? On a very unfortunate corner where turning right would take us right past a house with a fence jumping collie on top of a 7' hill, and turning left to get away from the monstrous noise and smell would run us past a toddler on one of those noisy plastic tricycles with a grandma on the porch talking loudly on her phone. 

Whoops! Nothing to do but try to distract him, and barring that, stay out of bite range. Game on!

Now, understand that this is a 75 pound dog, and I am a 200 and (mumble) pound woman. Short of picking him up and wrenching my back, I could *not* shift this dog once he realized that truck was heading right for us. It was like he'd grown in that patch of concrete. Muscles were literally quivering with anticipation. I was stuck between praying I didn't drop the leash so he wouldn't get flattened, and praying if I needed to I could drop the leash in time to get my arms clear of his mouth if it all went to shit. 

Miraculously, I didn't have to change my pants once we got home. Apparently I can thank St. Elmo, patron against abdominal distress, for that blessing. 

We were, blessedly, on opposite sides of a stop sign from the truck. Briefly I thought I had a shot at getting away if I waited until the truck stopped, went into idle, and I turned one of MacShane's "get the nerves out" circles into a curlicue and crossed the road. 

Just as I tried it... the (Richard Nixon's favorite word) truck driver laughed and honked the (Richard Nixon's favorite word) horn. 

Richard Nixon's favorite word that driver. 

So my temper got the better of me for a moment, and, not realizing the schmuck's window was down, I glared at the truck with one eye, keeping the other on MacShane in case he went from frantic spinning to lunging at my legs or snapping at my hands, and shouted "You're not Richard Nixon's favorite word helping with that. Thank you!" 

Imagine my shock when I saw the dude's hand come out of the hole where a window usually is and heard "Sorry! I didn't realize he was scared." 

Okay, first off, it's Richard Nixon's favorite wording cold out here, but I guess the window could be open for the smell. It is a garbage truck. 

Secondly, what could this guy think was going on with a dog obsessively spinning in circles at the side of the road that *blaring a horn* is going to improve?

And thirdly, I know what I look like when I'm in a good mood. If there weren't already flames shooting out of my ears at that fiasco, I apparently need to have some installed, because I know my Customer Service Bland expression was NO WHERE TO BE SEEN AT THAT MOMENT. What kind of person sees a resting bitch face that can burn holes through cinder blocks and thinks, "That's a happy situation, let me just add some background music."? 

At best, the methane is getting to that guy.

The walk home, comparatively, was perfect. Apparently seeing me get mad at the truck too made MacShane feel like we're a team against diesel or something. "Shrink your carbon footprint or else?" I don't know. Dog's gonna dog... and I'm gonna go gray *quickly* if that scenario happens much more often.

Sadly, I've officially now cussed at a city employee. I think that was the last square I needed on my "Welcome to St. Louis" bingo card, right next to "disappointing pizza," "almost creamed by a Laclede Cab," "free space," and "getting cut off by a junker car with tinted windows". 

I hope this big lug settles down before I can mark off a full card.

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack, And you may find yourself in another part of the world...

Well, I've suckered a few people in from here and there. (Welcome!) I feel the next best step is to tell people what to expect. Peter Jennings was a famous and well-liked newscaster when I was growing up. As a young reporter, he got a piece of advice from the equally famous Walter Cronkite. Between the two of them, they reported every major news event of the 20th century until Jennings' untimely death in the 90s. Somewhere in the 60s, Cronkite told Jennings to "Tell 'em what you're gonna tell 'em, tell 'em, then tell 'em what you told 'em." 

So, I'm going to tell you about our main players and how we approach the relationships between us all.

The Dramatis Personae include: 

Me: 39, F, St. Louis, MO but born in Ohio

The Guy: 36, M, St. Louis, MO but born in Nevada

McKie: Big dark brindle shaggy, stand up eared boy, age 11. Born on The Guy's foot when their pregnant female dog looked like she was going potty on the rug, except a puppy plopped out instead of a poop. Most of the time it was an upgrade, but then there are the days when he pulls open storage containers to go after food, after scattering garbage all over the mud room for one of the humans to clean up, that I start to wonder if a pet raccoon would be less chaotic to keep entertained. 

McKie has bitten at least 5 dogs and 3 humans, usually because the dog or human approached his human, his food, his water, or his treats. This habit is called resource guarding. Attached is a great article about addressing food guarding behavior if you're struggling with it. Food guarding is one of the most common behaviors that gets dogs sent to or returned to a shelter. It's some scary shit.

Thankfully for the most part, our management tactics at home work to keep us all safe. But that said, The Guy kicks himself regularly for listening to those "BE THE ALPHA WOLF, WUSSY MAN!!!1!" types that told him he should growl at Puppy!McKie when he showed interest in The Guy's food. Confronting the dog over food means that the confrontations are just going to get worse and worse the more food is around, and a dog is always faster with his teeth than a human is with his hands one day.

One day is all it takes for a dog to put someone in the hospital. We like to forget that part of living with fuzzy, smiley, interactive, social carnivores until someone needs stitches and a lawyer.

Most recently, the dog McKie grabbed got stuck between two pieces of furniture between McKie and The Guy, who also had a bag of really awesome treats and was getting ready to leave the house for work. As long as those resources aren't around, every willing dog is his buddy, assuming they practice basic dog manners. They were back to being friends within the week, in spite of the antibiotics, cone of shame, and stitches. 

McKie, of course, didn't have a mark on him. He's a crafty old bastard.

MacGyver : Little by our family's standards, he's black saddled with brindle legs, and luckily a pitty that still has his tail and ears. Dogs arrive with those parts, not so dimwits with scissors can hack them off to make their puppy "look hard", but so they can communicate with other dogs. The only parts we should be consistently removing from dogs are arguably rear dewclaws and reproductive organs, and even those last ones should be based on the individual dog's health and age. Speaking of that, MacGyver is... 7ish? Maybe 8? He comes in hot to greet everyone and goes paws up to look soulfully into your eyes, unless you're short, then he's kissing your face.

I first met him while I was working at a shelter in the city. I went into the kennel with him to try to put his leash on and he was so happy to have a chance at some enrichment he leapt into the air to kiss me and split my lip. During his time there, someone with a piece of paper and maybe a photo of him decided he was dangerous, and had him slated to be killed. But he was perfectly polite and playful with dogs at the shelter and warmed up to staff well enough after a couple of days. We chose his name for being able to take apart every iteration of garbage containment or collection we've come up with. For normal dogs, these guidelines for dog-proofing your home will probably work well. For MacGyver, they were simply step one. 

This dog knows how to take apart Steak n Shake cups to get the last of the whipped cream out of the narrow cup holder bit. He knows how to hold and squeeze open sauce containers from fast food places, and can smell the difference between ranch and hot sauce before it gets all over him. He knows how to open up empty chip bags to lick out the crumbs without them getting stuck on his face. He is bound and determined to catch more mice running through the basement than the cat ever will. Skills like those come with the territory of running around South City starving and hunting cockroaches and dumpster rats to survive, I guess, but for all of that, he's cat friendly too. 

So why he now lunges and nips at people and animals alike on leash, I don't freakin' know, but I'm nearing the end of my wits about it. When he barks, he sounds like he's about 22# and fluffy. He's short and a little longer than he is wide, and a solid 58# of "Do you have food? Oh, then we can cuddle. Here's the tummy spot I like scratched." 

Unless you put him on a leash, then he pulls like a Husky on speed qualifying for the Iditarod, but in zig zags.

MacShane: Long legged, wrinkle faced with ears softer than velvet and big melty brown eyes, he's a fox red hunk of love... once he's had a few weeks to get used to you. If you just walk up to this dog in public or stop by the house, expect to bleed. And he's fast. No, or at least very little, warning comes when he decides to bite; suddenly you're dripping blood on the floor and he's in a defensible position across the room, braced for further conflict. 

Keeping him as calm as possible is our priority number one right now. We're seven days into the project and I'm freaking out. MacShane's eating out of puzzle toys, enjoying his walk through the neighborhood before we go to work, and bounding around the living room with a squeaky toy in his face. But, so far, he's not relaxing yet, and that's okay. He's just spent over a year back at the shelter, after several months in a home that took great steps to try to heal his broken heart and stress-depleted mind. I don't expect miracles. His decision to lay on the throw rug in the living room while I cooked dinner last night warmed the cockles of my cold little heart. 

His decision to walk into his wide-open "designed for Great Danes" crate in the kitchen and chill out inside it with the door open gave me my first sigh of relief in a week. There's more good information here about getting ready for an adopted dog and making their first days easier. Please don't kid yourselves, though; adopting a new dog is rarely what people would call "easy".

Finally, what is not going on. 

Readers aren't getting anyone's real names, here, nor are we using the name of the rescue. That is all intentional and please don't doxx us (release personal info like names, addresses, or methods of contact). South City's risky enough without weirdos finding me off the Internet. 

If I find and use products that make our life simpler and easier, I will link them with my honest thoughts on the product or service. If someone ever pays me to talk about their stuff, and I take them up on it, I will tell you that well in advance. We're advertised at too much for my taste as it is. I will not turn on the "adsense" thinger because I can't control who or what shows up through that gadget. I will not have certain damaging, toxic schools of "training" (really more of a mindset that excuses abuse, toward animals and humans alike, and makes the biggest blow-hards in the industry scads of money) showing up in a way that looks like they are something I endorse. 

I sum it up this way: if social services would investigate or arrest someone for using a device or "teaching method" on a human toddler, the device or method should not be used on a dog. If you are angry when you start and feel relieved or powerful when you're done, you're not teaching, you're abusing. End of discussion. Unless your questions are polite, respectful, and informed, don't attempt to engage me in debate about this point. Take that shit elsewhere. Here, four-leggers and two-leggers alike are safe. So are three-leggers and no-leggers, and even eight-leggers if I have a deli cup and a piece of paper handy. 

But abusers aren't welcome. I've had enough of those in my life, thank you very much, and I will not become that same kind of nightmare fuel to my dogs.

You May Be Right; I May Be Crazy, but I Just May Be the Lunatic You're Looking for...

I once earned a forty thousand dollar university degree which stressed that the introduction of any piece of writing is "supposed" to set the scene, but do it while gripping the reader's interest firmly with first few sentences. 

If being a dog trainer thirty thousand dollars in student loan debt has taught me anything, the lesson is that what we decide is "supposed" to happen is rarely what *actually* happens. 

This log of the adventure that has been and will be living with a house full of dogs that at any moment could hospitalize myself, my fiance, or another dog isn't much more than a vague idea in the clouds right now. I'm not sure I know what "supposed to" should look like, really. Nothing that was "supposed" to happen in my last 39 years has ever really shaken out the way anyone planned. Originally, my parents decided, I would attend a university on a generous scholarship, graduate in four years and become a teacher in my home town before getting married and having children for them to spoil while I was at work.

That didn't happen, though I've spent enough hours in a public school classroom to know I would have been miserable if that plan had come to fruition. We won't touch on my "late" marriage in my 30s, or my divorce, or my childlessness. Those are topics for another forum, or perhaps a well-appointed leather sofa in a psychologist's office.

Originally, my Post-Divorce Five Year Plan was to take a job in St. Louis, MO at an animal shelter, spend some time growing my skills as a dog trainer and handler, and then find a place that felt like "home" to start my own training business. 

What wasn't supposed to happen? Well, I adopted a dog deemed unadoptable by the shelter administration and kept him from being killed for space. That addition definitely wasn't on the carefully numbered list of steps I had optimistically labeled "The Path to Fulfillment" after thumbing through a self-help book over half a bottle of upstate New York sweet white wine. 

Then my living situation had to change and suddenly this "crazy dog" had to learn to live with another "crazy dog" that is bigger than him, stronger than him, in some ways smarter than him, and carries a steamer trunk of his own issues centered around resource protection and isolation fear. 

We were either very lucky or we're damn good at what we do and just don't really give ourselves enough credit. Meshing our "fur-kids" into one bedroom has been exceptionally smooth. Not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but smooth. Space and needs are respected between both boys. Good, healthy, social dog play happens more or less daily. No one has bled because the wrong toy was found in the wrong place by the wrong dog. There was one minor tiff, about two years ago now, over who would be hunting the opossum that arrived on the wrong side of the privacy fence one evening. We stopped a continuation of the disagreement by simply keeping one at a time in the yard in the evening. The first step of training, after all, is management. So far we have failed to convince the opossum of the wisdom of this practice.

But really, we are blessed. 

We are also crazy.

On New Year's Day of 2021, we brought home another "crazy" dog from the shelter where we work, a dog that had been returned more than once for uncontrollable or violent behavior, but who loves us both dearly. 

Seriously, we must be crazy. *Three* "problem" dogs? Ignoring the collective issues of the humans involved, we now have to navigate resource guarding, under-socialization at crucial stages of development, physical abuse, the fallout of spending literal *years* living loose as a stray and/or in an animal shelter, and behavior consistent with separation or confinement anxiety which I cannot accurately diagnose because Dammit, Jim, I'm a dog trainer, not a veterinary behaviorist! (That's more like a ninety thousand dollar degree.)

What were we thinking?! 

Well, I think we were thinking about how much we, the humans involved, have grown and healed as we've watched literally thousands of dogs pulled from the cruelest and most painful situations a human can orchestrate go on to recover and flourish. 

I think we both independently wish we could scoop up every single dog inside those walls and give them a safe, calm, restful place of their own, with space to play and nap with the sun on their bellies and be with the people or animals that they like and trust the most... a place where they can heal themselves like they have healed us. 

I know we both know that dream is impractical at best.

Many years ago I read a story on a souvenir magnet in some roadside gas station about an old man watching a little boy toss starfish back into the ocean as the tide ebbed, stranding the animals to die. 

"Why bother running around, spending all that effort?" the senior asks. "Look down the beach. There are hundreds of them. You can't possibly make a difference!" 

And the little boy pauses for a second, bends and picks up another star fish, and lobs it into the deeper water, like he had dozens before. Then the child looks at the old man and says, "I made a difference to that one." 

So, here we are, dashing down a beach as the tide changes, and changes, and changes yet again, facing a slew of helpless animals in need.

We can't possibly save them all, but three times now, we made a difference to that one. 

We must be crazy.