Travels with Sadie 2 — Recovering the Special Ball

25 Thursday Jul 2024

Tags

ball, determination, dog, grit, pets, play, pool, story

Sadie, for those not already in the know, is half Golden Retriever and half Poodle—a “Golden Doodle.” She resembles a Golden Retriever much more than she resembles a Poodle. And, she takes the name “Retriever” seriously. Ever since she was a puppy, we’ve played ball.

We began these games with tennis balls. Our dog trainer, at one point, brought out a “Squeaky Ball” which resembles a tennis ball and bounces like one (slightly less bouncy) but has the additional feature that if you squeeze it, it makes a squeak. From that moment on, Sadie has preferred squeaky balls. I’ve tried some other types of safe balls. She has enjoyed the soccer ball a little but has totally eschewed the pickle ball.

One of the many games we play with tennis balls is for me to go to one end of the driveway and hit squeaky balls with a tennis racquet. Sometimes she catches them on one bounce and sometimes she chases them along the ground. Once in while, she runs forward to catch the ball on the fly. I keep meaning to ask my dentists and/or my vet about this.

An associated game is “grab and go.” Sadie will trot over to me and drop one of her squeaky balls right below her mouth. I use a grabber to try to snatch the ball off the ground before she can. I generally lose this game. I’ve tried many ways to distract her and a few of them worked initially. But now, she’s too savvy. Even novel ways to distract her don’t work. On some occasions, I do manage to snatch it away quickly enough. I’d estimate that happens about ten percent of the time. More often, before I manage to grab it, she gets bored and nudges the ball forward toward me with her nose to signal that I can now grab it without a struggle.

To understand the next part, you’ll need to know that our garden features two very large Italian stone pine trees. I love them. However, they do tear up the driveway and yard to an extent. In a few places large roots surface and then form tiny “caves” beneath the roots. Sadie scooted the ball into one of these caves and then, in the process of retrieving it, pushed it in even further. I could not get to it. I put an iron chair over the spot so Sadie wouldn’t tear up everything living within ten feet. I told her it was lost and there was no way to get it back. She “accepted this” or at least she stopped trying. We soon went in for dinner and did not revisit the back garden and pool until the next day, in the early afternoon.

We were beginning to play alternating sets of “games around the pool” with games that take place in the garden. Sometimes, as happened this afternoon, Sadie likes to begin the pool games by lounging in the sun (until she’s so hot, she knows it will feel even more delicious when she hits the cool water? IDK.) Since she wasn’t yet ready to play ball, I went down in the garden to retrieve some more balls for pool play. Once I got down there, with Sadie so far away, I took another crack at trying to get her “Special Ball” out from under the roots. (It’s much easier to try to get it out without Sadie trying to “help.”)

This shows Sadie lounging but *with* her “special ball.” It was taken a few weeks ago.

I tried several different methods to no avail. Suddenly, I heard a thundering sound. It was Sadie sprinting and springing to my position and she instantly set to the task of retrieving her special ball. She stuffed her snout in so far I was sure she couldn’t breathe. And, even if nose touched the ball, there would not be enough room for her to open her jaws on the ball.

She got the ball out. We celebrated for a time by centering our games around her recently recovered Special Ball. For example, I throw three or four balls into the pool and Sadie grabs the nearest one but then, while treading water, trades the nearest one for her “Special Ball.” In a garden variety game, on the other hand, she might lead me down the garden path, while holding her “Special Ball” in her mouth. At some point, she will inconspicuously drop the ball and it’s up to me to find it. Then, she lags back in the lower part of the garden while I ascend to the Stone Patio and throw the ball. This allows her to come crashing through the garden at full speed catching the escaping “Special Ball” from behind.

What I can see of Sadie as I write this. She lies on my feet (so that?); she knows the instant I get up to do something which she recognizes as an opportunity to interrupt my behavioral flow with her requests.

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Sadie and the lighty ball

Sadie the sifter

Sadie is a thief

Sadie and the Squeaky Ball

Dog Years

A Suddenly Springing Something

A Cat’s a Cat

Author Page on Amazon

Travels with Sadie 1: Lamppost, Sign Pole, and Fire Hydrant.

23 Tuesday Jul 2024

Posted by petersironwood in Uncategorized

≈ 13 Comments

Tags

Democracy, dogs, life, pets, politics, truth

Did you ever read “Travels with Charley” by Steinbeck? “Charley” is the name of Steinbeck’s dog who travels with him on a car trip across America, or at least the first 48 states thereof. My wife and I—and our dog Sadie— recently met up with my cousin-in-law (is that a word? I guess it is now). Cousin-in-law Timm loves dogs too and suggested I should do a similar journal called “Travels with Sadie” and this is, indeed, the first chapter of “Travels with Charley.”

I chose this topic while reflecting, as I often do, on what the world is like for Sadie and her kin. Sadie, like most, is thrilled to meet other dogs. If she can’t meet them in person, the next best thing is to sniff the spots where they peed. Although she hasn’t yet reached estrous, in the last few months, she’s been behaving differently with respect to the pee residue of female dogs on the ground and male dogs, which are on bushes, trees, lampposts, sign poles, and fire hydrants.

It seems that the males inordinately prefer lampposts, sign poles, and fire hydrants over trees. That, to me, at first seemed curious. After all, trees have been in the picture for dogs and their ancestors for millions of years. These manufactured artifacts are brand new.

Here’s my hypothesis. In the long-ago days of dogs, some dogs took it upon themselves to signal their presence by peeing on manufactured posts while others preferred trees. A post has fewer distractions—visual, aural, and most importantly, the olfactory sense. Thus, the post-preferring peers had a more impressive social presence resulting in more mating and more envy—higher ranking in the pack. Over time, the post-preferring peers proliferated and prospered.

Over time, and perhaps even initially, the individual dog itself could “learn” that it had left a more salient and more lasting impression. How? Because they go back to the spot they themselves peed in, often repeatedly. Thus, they would learn that make a splash in the dog world, you’re better off with a human artifact. The fact that it smells like a human when it is first put into place may well “seed” the site as a place to exchange messages—perhaps a kind of canine Facebook—only not really the face.

It also turns out that lampposts, sign poles, and fire hydrants signify three essential functions of a society. Lampposts are to shine light on reality. Medical research, science research, education, public service announcements, and books. To some extent, our laws are also a kind of lamppost. “Look people, we’ve learned the hard way, that it’s not good to steal. Don’t do it.”

Well, if that’s not clear enough, fine, we’ll write 100,000 pages of clarification.

Sign posts include, to me, norms and customs, as well as directions of various sorts. There’s often a tension between lampposts and sign poles. The sign poles take work to design, manufacture, transport, and erect. That stop sign down the street didn’t just fall off the coconut tree. Similarly, customs, for instance, separating the work of men and women so that all nurses were women and all men were doctors, take work to implement and to enforce. People will not always stop at a stop sign and especially if they are never ticketed. Similarly, there will be individual women who desire to become a doctor and men who want to be nurses. There will always be tension in such customs between the norm and the individual desires.

Imagine after a lot of work has gone into putting up the stop sign, the lamppost function of government sponsors a study that shows it would be much better to put in a traffic circle (roundabout) rather than the four stop signs. More traffic gets through faster and there are fewer accidents. You can easily imagine some resistance. The people who profit from making the stop signs, for instance, and the police officers who ticket those who only come to a “rolling stop.” The drivers may also object. Many of them aren’t used to traffic circles. Some initial awkwardness is predictable.

To me, the fire hydrant represents the protective aspects of government. There are many! There are agencies, like the FDA, that ensure the cleanliness of our food and water. (Believe it or not, there are some providers who are so greedy, that they would actually sell you tainted food or drink if it would make them richer.) There are the Armed Forces, the Fire Departments, the Police Forces. In a way, Social Security and Medicare also fall into this region. It is a protective function of government.

Sadie, meanwhile, is sacked out on the couch across from me. She’s had an active day; two long walks, zoomies, swimming, and ball playing. Our dog, like many, is very loving. She’s wary of anything new. But soon, she’ll be head over heels in love with another person.

The very greedy people who would have you kowtow to them while they steal the fruits of your labor love to use the rationalization that it’s a “Dog eat dog world out there.” It isn’t actually. Neither humans (for the most part) nor dogs (for the most part) are out there eating others of their own species. We are both pack animals. We both love and protect our families. Is there competition? Sure. But it’s all done in the scope of a cooperative society.

The natural tension between conservatives and liberals has a lot to do with how quickly one wants to see lamppost findings supplant existing psychic and physical infrastructure. And it is a very legitimate debate to have. Most do not want the extreme that every new finding in, say, medical research should instantaneously turn traditions and practices on their heads. Also, most do not want to ignore all new science and discovery and keep everything static forever.

What is not a legitimate debate is for one side, like a spoiled toddler, to insist that if they don’t get their way, they’ll burn our civilization to the ground. Sadie wouldn’t do that. Nor would I. Nor would most Americans.