h2>Dating : My Next Love Affair Begins in an Iowa Farm Field
“A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than you love yourself.” — Josh Billings
Then 2020 roared in!
You all know the story, Corona Virus, Covid 19 materialized and changed the world as we know it. Work dried up, suddenly I was home all the time.
Maybe the time had come for a dog.
Thinking about my experience and what I wanted, I came up with a top 5 breeds list. I wanted a large dog, loyal and short haired with a tendency not to shed much.
I checked around to the local humane societies finding out that I was apparently the last one to want a dog. There was no inventory left, just a Pit Bull or two.
Having just watched Call of the Wild with Harrison Ford, I was in love immediately with the dog in the film. The Tacoma Humane society had one dog available, his name was Bosworth. He looked just like the dog in the movie. It felt like an omen, meant to be, I was excited.
I sent the adoption coordinator an email message and waited.
“If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and man.” — Mark Twain
After several weeks she finally replied via email and asked me a few questions while telling me about Bosworth. She said he was aggressive and very mouthy, he liked to bite.
I explained this did not alarm me as dogs don’t have hands, they use their mouth like we use our hands.
She also said he could never be around other dogs and wanted to know if I would expect him to. I wondered what kind of life it would be if I was never able to be around any other humans.
To make a long story short, she did not like my answers and said I was a poor fit for Bosworth, Huh? I fought it for a bit, but finally let go and moved on.
Being a boarder of dogs, I have had the opportunity to work with many breeds. This has informed me about traits and characteristics, some desirable and others not so much.
A few breeds I had been impressed with were the Austrian Shepherd and Blue Healer. Suddenly, there was a message from a dog lover I knew about a Australian Shepherd that needed rescuing.
“Such short little lives our pets have to spend with us, and they spend most of it waiting for us to come home each day.” — John Grogan
The owner’s Mom had told me this Aussie had a problem with aggression. As she spoke I could not help but think of my experience with dogs. I’ve never met one I could not interact with successfully, though some do take longer than others.
My thought was that she was inexperienced and exaggerating, only one of those turned out to be true.
I asked for her to bring him outside upon my arrival, more neutral territory, or so I thought. Before they came out I noticed there was no fenced yard. They lived in a duplex and 4 or 5 kids were playing next door in the driveway.
Then, out they came, the boyfriend handling Oscar the Aussie. The dog came immediately frothing at the mouth moving right at me, the man could barely hold the animal. Feeling surprised I watched as he then tried to go after the kids playing next door. None of the treats I had in my pocket interested the little monster.
We tried to go inside and he kept lunging at me fiercely, so they put him in a wire crate with no cushion where he spends most of his time in the living room. The rest of his day and night is spent locked in the garage.
The only time he gets to go out is for potty breaks and who knows how long it is between those. The more we talked the more his mental condition made sense.
The story went as she explained they quit having people over and ever taking him out for walks because he wanted to kill everyone.
While they talked I searched for an off leash dog park in the area. Turns out there was one about a mile away they knew nothing about. They immediately objected saying “Oh there will be other people there” I simply replied, “That’s OK, I’ll tell them our situation, they will let us have it to ourselves”
Which is indeed what happened, Oscar seemed confused when we got in and let him off the lead. He stopped lunging at me and I thought there was some hope to save him. He wondered around acting like he had never seen a tree before. I felt very sorry for him and for them as well, but not as much.
Then, when we decided to leave I asked them all to go outside the gate leaving me to interact with Oscar on my own, which they did.
He followed them to the gate then turned and looked at me. I knelt down offering him a treat in my hand while speaking to him calmly. He began to walk towards me with his head held low. Hope was filling me up inside, could this be my dog soon?
Then as he got within sniffing distance of the treat, he quickly bit me hard in the middle finger. We all were done at that point and I was bleeding. I remember thinking, Caesar the Dog Whisperer was right, he does not help people with dog problems, he helps dogs with people problems.
He bit so hard his teeth went all the way thru my finger, I ended up losing the nail. It’s been 6 months and it is still not back to normal.
Still not ready to give up I offered to take him to a specialist who may be able to help. She has 10 acres of wooded area boarding and training dogs there. A week later we arrived, he tried to kill her too, I gave up and decided the universe was trying to tell me something.
“There is no faith which has never yet been broken, except that of a truly faithful dog” — Konrad Lorenz
Oh yeah, fast forward 6 months, I pulled off to the side on a rural road in Iowa next to a cornfield to access the back of the van for needed hydration.
That’s when I heard it, a rustling in the tall corn. As a wildlife photographer, my ears are always listening for an approaching animal.
My life was getting ready to change drastically.
I moved over from the back of the van to see what was happening and there just emerging from the tall corn stalks was a dog.
I suppose this was given away early by the title and opening picture. There he was, I called him over cautiously, my last incident still fresh in my mind. He came right over, there would be no new bite, at least not yet.
He was panting heavily although it was not very hot. Using the top of a cheap Styrofoam cooler, I filled it with water and set it down. He dove in trying to bite at the water anxiously, it had been a while since he had any, finishing it in seconds.
Thinking about what I may have in the car to feed him, I remembered an unopened pound bag of beef jerky. He wanted it all, and did not want me to leave.