Monday, May 16, 2005

Debunking the wild dog myth


Suzy the Border Collie here. It recently came to my attention that many dogs think it would be nice to be free. Free of fences and leashes, free of people telling them what they can eat and when. Where & when they can poop & pee, who they can bark at, you get the picture.
 
I've got some news for these dogs. I was once homeless. Yes me, the dog on the corner. The one who stays at her house even when she gets out of her yard! Homeless, that's a bad word. Before my family rescued me from a terrible place called the "Animal Shelter" where I had to stay in a cage made of cold concrete bricks and chain link fences, I lived, if you can call it that, with a homeless man. We never had any food, no place to call home, no safe yard to call my own, no hairbrush or even my own blanket.
 
I was loved and cuddled. But terrible thinks were done to me. I cannot even begin to tell Kim and Pat & the boys how one of my molars on my bottom jaw was knocked out. Buy the time I came to live with them it was fully healed. The only clue I give them is I shy away from anything they toss that they want to to catch, toys, Frisbees, balls, even treats. Anything that sounds like a gunshot is scary. I have flashbacks to a terrible day filled with gunshots and I am sure that this time, they are after me.
 
These are the best things about having a home and a family of my own.
my people
my yard
my fence which I inspect my border daily for breaches in fence integrity and report them to my family as soon as possible.
my water bowl with fresh clean cool water something never to be under appreciated
my own little dog house/den
my own trees
grass (yum, fresh salad)
rose bushes because every girl needs flowers in her life
food , dinner scraps, good dog treats, belly rubs, back rubs, sticker removal service
regular hair brushing means no more having snarled mats of hair that have to be cut out
a grandma, grandpa and an aunt Michele who my cousin Lulu the pup lives with.
 
You cannot have any of these things if you are a bad dog and run away. In  fact, some of the dogs in that cold shelter place were there because they ran away and were lost or they kept running away and their people gave up on them. The people at shelter are nice, but a cold cage is no place for any self respecting dog to be.
 
Now in my new home I am safe. I have a micro chip in my shoulder that I can't even feel anymore so that if there is an emergency and I get lost, my family can find me. I wear my collar all day everyday so I can keep my doggie ID tag and license proving I have had my rabies shot with me at all times. I see all these dogs trying to get our and run away from perfectly good families because they think they want to be free. I try to tell them that they should go home, that they shouldn't be out without one of their people. And if they are with their people but not on a leash, I bark as loud as I can to tell them that they should not do that, a dog off a leash can get lured into the street by a cat or bird and then hit by a car, but the people never understand me and the dogs ignore me.
 
Well, I'm tired, I'm going to go lay in the sun and sleep for a few hours. Wake me up when my people come home.
 
 
 
 
 


--
Kim Wyatt
www.kimwyatt.com

2 comments:

birdwoman said...

Border Collies Rule!!

We also have one, and he wouldn't run if we paid him.

(*)>

Contemporary Southwestern Artist said...

Ours will run if we're not in the yard with her, but when we are out there she wants to sit or lay by us. I think we're supposed to feel flattered!

I can see your dog now, "you wanna run, go ahead I can keep an eye on you from here."