Dog Named Leaf (16 page)

L
INDA AND
I
WERE NOW MORE DETERMINED THAN EVER TO FIND
greater balance in our lives. For me, this included early—and I mean early—morning walks around the lake with Linda and Leaf before I went to work. Whenever I wasn’t traveling I kept to this routine.

All my time with Leaf at home and on these daily walks, plus our late-afternoon and Saturday morning trips to dog parks, allowed me to observe his emerging personality in a variety of situations. Many people with pets love their animal companions and treat them well. But their lives are busy. They don’t have the time or interest to pay close attention to the animals’ personalities, preferences, and points of view.

As my healing process continued, I felt grateful to have Leaf reveal himself to me in ways I’d never experienced with any other dog. In dog years he was a teenage boy who fascinated me with his mix of machismo, intelligence, empathy, playfulness, energy, and curiosity.

More than any pet I’d ever lived with, Leaf showed me that animals consciously use analytical ability and free will to make choices. I’d never observed those facets of dog sentience so clearly until I had the opportunity to closely and consistently spend quality time with Leaf. His capacity for weighing pros and cons and choosing a course of action simply amazed me.

Being human, I interpreted his actions from a human perspective. I wasn’t privy to his thought processes and could only guess what he might
have said if he’d had the language. I didn’t know the reasons he did things that sometimes astounded me. I had no desire to turn him into a person and thoroughly appreciated his
dogness.
Still, he continually surprised me with his humanlike characteristics. He did things that I’d never read or heard were in a dog’s repertoire.

I had read an article entitled “What Is the Cognitive Rift Between Humans and Other Animals?” in
Science Daily
about a Harvard University scientist named Marc Hauser who had discovered four key differences between how humans and animals think. Several of Dr. Hauser’s conclusions caught my attention. They made me wonder if he had lived with pets or only studied them under research conditions. He contrasted humans to other animals by saying that animals have “laser beam” intelligence. In other words, they use a specific solution for a specific problem but don’t apply the solution to new situations or different types of problems.

Well, Hauser hasn’t met Leaf.

Take for example the Kong. We would buy a variety of those rubber toys into which you can insert goodies to keep your dog contentedly occupied for hours. After we gave a Kong to Leaf, he’d have to figure out how to open it and retrieve the treat. This can take a blessedly long time and provides peace and quiet at our dinnertime. Each Kong is constructed differently. Some have only a top opening. Some have both a top and bottom opening. Others split in half and screw open. They also vary in shape.

We had seen Leaf apply any number of strategies to opening Kongs. He had relationships with them. He growled at them.
You’d better open up or I’ll make you miserable.
Then he switched to sweet talk. He kissed the Kongs in his version of good cop–bad cop. He bounced them down the steps to loosen whatever was inside. He rolled them and made conjoined parts break open. He waited until the food inside started to thaw and then tackled the Kong with renewed vigor. He pushed the Kong around
with his nose, batted it with his paws, licked it with his tongue. Each of these strategies he applied to the different Kongs until he found the right combination for each of them to reveal their secret goodies.

So, Dr. Hauser, although I haven’t seen our dog apply his strategies for getting the treats out of variously shaped Kongs to opening a can of tuna, I differ with your conclusions about one of the four distinguishing features of human vs. animal cognition. Our dog, like other dogs I’ve heard about, applies a variety of strategies to a variety of situations.

In addition to gaining insights about Leaf’s personality, emotions, and unique view of the world, walking with him around the lakes and ponds on early summer mornings provided a connection with nature that Linda
and I treasured. We watched the sunrises turn rippling waters pinkish blue. These outings became my reminders that life is good. Nature often provided my lessons for the day.

I found Leaf to be complex and at the same time simple.
What does he think about?
I pondered while I watched him. Clearly food, play, and sniffing things, but what’s this obsession with ducks? If he wasn’t straining on his leash to chase them, he was watching them intently. When they dove under the water, he’d look over his shoulder at us as if to ask,
Where did they go? How can those ducks do it all? They walk, swim, fly, and disappear!

I know it sounds silly, but Leaf’s new interest in ducks inspired us to educate him about them. Linda started finding interesting tidbits about ducks to share with him on our walks. After he watched the ducks digging in the moist ground following a summer rainstorm, she told him, “Ducks eat bugs and worms.”

OK, so we’re nuts. We told our dog little-known facts to make his and our walks more enjoyable. No harm in it. And I was learning more about ducks than I ever wanted to know.

During our three- to four-mile lake walks, I paid attention to what else attracted Leaf. He seemed interested in particular trees and garbage cans. In her book
Inside of a Dog,
Alexandra Horowitz writes, “Dogs don’t act on the world by handling objects or by eyeballing them, as people might, or by pointing and asking others to act on the object, instead they bravely stride right up to a new, unknown object, stretch their magnificent snouts within millimeters of it, and take a nice deep sniff.” With deep, noisy sniffs and what appeared to be contemplative thoughts, he studied the odors they emitted, then fulfilled his one-leg-up obligation followed by kicking his back legs. Were these trees and trash cans some kind of dog blog, and was Leaf adding his final or superior comments?

While Leaf had to stop often to read, catalog, and comment, Linda would complain, “I need to get my heart rate up.” Leaf never had that
problem. With his short legs, he had to take twice as many steps as we did in order to keep up. Sometimes Leaf and I would run several hundred yards ahead of Linda. He’d look back at her with a big grin on his face and then sprint back like a speeding arrow. When he arrived in Linda’s outstretched arms, his joy erupted with a wagging tail and lots of doggy licks.

One morning when we were on the last leg of our walk, it started raining. Fortunately, Linda had brought a fold-up umbrella in her jacket pocket. She pulled it out and asked, “Do you want to get under this with me?” Leaf must have thought she was talking to him.
Sure.
He immediately moved under the umbrella. The three of us, with Leaf in the middle, finished our walk and made it to the car without getting drenched.

After one of our walks, I took Leaf to the pet store, where I bought food for the cats, the bird, and Leaf. He loved this place. There were boxes of dog treats at floor level that turned him into a determined shoplifter. He often poked his nose into dog toys to see which ones squeaked. The buckets of chew bones were a favorite pit stop for him.

A ten-year-old boy came up to me as Leaf explored the toys. “Can I pet your dog?” he asked. I said yes. Without my prompting, Leaf ran over to the boy for a quick pat on the head. Then he rushed back to the toys to continue his investigations.

The boy said quietly, “My dog died yesterday.”

I refrained from simply saying “I’m sorry” and listened to my inner voice telling me that the boy needed a man to acknowledge his pain. I gently said, “It must hurt a lot.”

The little boy replied, “Yes, it does.” Stoically he added that his dog had died of cancer and lost any awareness of where he was at the end.

Because nothing normally distracts him from a good toy hunt, I was surprised when Leaf stopped what he was doing. He seemed to be listening as the child spoke with such grief about his dog. Abandoning his search for the perfect squeaky toy, Leaf walked back to the boy. This time
he stayed a little longer as the child petted him. I remained quiet while Leaf comforted the grieving child.

The boy looked up at me. The sparkle in his eyes revealed that our healing little cocker spaniel had silently, for a moment, lifted the burden of loss from his heart. The child said thank you and went back to his parents.

Leaf reaffirmed my belief that a loving animal can serve as an instrument of something beyond our day-to-day life, a source of love that some call the “Divine.” Someone’s heart is broken, and God’s love directs a creature with a wagging tail, soft fur, sweet eyes, and a kind heart where he’s most needed.

Leaf, like me, was healing and becoming whole. As he grew healthier, so did I. And as his heart grew more loving, open, and sensitive to the needs of people he didn’t know, so did mine.

L
EAF HAD MANY OPPORTUNITIES TO APPLY HIS PROBLEM-SOLVING
strategies upon his return to formal classroom studies. He had been forced to join the ranks of Dog School Dropouts when my medical issues started, but now that these were at least temporarily resolved, we signed him up again for what we referred to as Dog Training 101, the introductory course.

Leaf knew how to sit when asked on occasion and sometimes to stay when it suited him. But he needed to be calmer around visitors to our home, as well as to come when called and follow other commands that are essential for a dog’s safety. Some might consider Leaf’s ignorance of basic commands as a sign that Linda and I weren’t very good pet parents. But we had just been derailed and decided it would be best to start over.

“Look at me,” I said during a practice training session on our first day back in class. Linda and I were tickled to watch Leaf immediately comply. He jerked his head up dramatically, widened his eyes, and fixed his gaze upon my face.
I’m looking. Got it? I’m looking. Time for a treat. Where is my treat?

Leaf’s classes became the source of fun, as he taught me more than I was teaching him. One thing I observed was that if education is fun, learning commands and tricks are not so hard to accomplish. It was as if he were saying,
Why take everything so seriously?

He even learned to associate visitors to our home with getting rewards. This was our dog trainer Heather Anderson’s bright idea. Don’t know why I didn’t think of it. Leaf’s fears that our invited guests might harm him or someone he loved diminished as he became more interested in the treats they might have for him.

The class met once a week for six weeks, and we always got assignments to practice with Leaf at home. He responded well to the “clicker training” approach, which associates a distinct sound with the moment the dog does what the person has asked him to do. Leaf caught on quickly that a click meant a treat would soon follow. Unlike Taylor, who had watched other dogs in class and imitated whatever they did, Leaf wasn’t interested in learning from his classmates. He only wanted to sniff them and let them know he was Alpha Dog of the World.

On the last day of Training 101, I looked at our cocker spaniel and saw joy in his little body. He marched with enthusiasm toward the door of the large pet-supply store where classes were held in a partitioned area.

Once inside, Leaf’s nose kicked into high gear. There were the intoxicatingly glorious smells of peanut-butter treats, liver snacks, and beef chew bones. His ecstatic expression told of an altered state of consciousness. The experience, overwhelming in its scope, seemed to make him come completely alive.

As he began to regain his sense of balance, Leaf started toward the toy aisle. The shelves were at floor level. Dogs had easy access to picking toys they wanted to bring home. On occasion I’d overhear a comment about a dog shoplifting on aisle 3. Leaf had very high standards when it came to selecting a toy. Did he like how it felt in his mouth? Did it bounce? Did he prefer the color? Could he shake it? Did it squeak or make some other noise? The store had a smart marketing ploy. I, for one, never got out of there without buying something for Leaf or our other pets.

But today we didn’t have time for browsing. Right now, our only concern was that Leaf knew how to sit, stay, leave it, take it, and wait at the door when we asked him to do tasks. Linda looked down at her boy and said, “This is your graduation day. We’re so proud of you.”

Before he could graduate, though, he’d have to pass the dog-training test. This made Linda and me a little anxious because Leaf wasn’t always consistent with following commands at home or in class. Often when we asked him to sit, for example, we never knew what we’d get. He’d consider the command for a moment or two and then decide to comply or not. We had even less confidence with telling him to stay. When I gave this command, I had to thrust my hand in front of his face, say “stay” in a firm voice, and walk away from him. His job was to root his butt to the floor until I swept a hand along my side in an inviting gesture and gave the verbal command to “come.” This, of course, was followed by a treat for not doing what he usually did, which was blithely pad along behind me as I attempted to walk away.

Worst of all was the incomprehensible “leave it” command. To practice this, I had to place a treat in front of his paw. He was not supposed to eat it until I told him, “Take it.” Leaf did not see the logic behind this other than to please his beloved humans (not much of an incentive) and get extra kisses and treats (this worked).
Leave it? Why would I do that?
Then there was also the fact that Leaf got mixed messages at home about “leaving” things. He had the habit of licking dishes in the dishwasher whenever Linda or I opened the door. No matter where he was in the house, he’d hear the door unlatch and fly into the kitchen.

Linda sounded like the chorus to a love-gone-wrong song as she sang, “Leave it. Leave it.” Meanwhile, Leaf licked the dishes like a dog who had never been fed, much less eaten dinner only a few minutes ago. After he’d licked every morsel he could find, he’d stop, sit, and wait for his treat. She’d say, “Take it,” and give him his reward. After all, he’d finally obeyed her command and left the dishes alone. He’d figured out that to get the treat, all he needed to do was lick the dishes first. It’s not easy to train a dog who is smarter than you are.

When we entered the training room, we saw that Leaf’s classmates, all in high spirits, had already arrived. Their nervous humans sat behind them. After explaining the sequence of events for the evening, Heather announced, “You’re also going to have your dog do a trick we taught in class. It can be something like ‘roll over’ or ‘shake hands.’ You pick which one.”

I suddenly broke into a sweat as I looked down at Leaf. Leaf acted like he didn’t have a care in the world. I shouldn’t have worried, though, because after a few stumbles, Leaf managed to make it through all the Training 101 commands. For his trick, he shook my hand. Heather was impressed as he sat, stayed, and came without hesitation. I snapped his picture when she handed Linda his graduation certificate.

I told our new graduate that he could pick out any toy before we left the store. After much deliberation he selected the twin brother of
his favorite squeaky, foot-long dog and carried it to the cash register in his mouth.

All the positive changes in Leaf’s personality were making me think about how to be more like him. His need to be Alpha Dog was transforming itself into leadership. His distrust was softening into cautiousness. His distractedness was turning into focus. He was living life without over-thinking things. Even though he anticipated a situation and responded thoughtfully, he no longer seemed fearful of the future. These were all qualities I wanted to increase in myself. Since Leaf so often served as my mirror, I wondered if I too was growing into the person I’d always wanted to be.

One day when I picked up Leaf at doggy day care, I found him in the playroom with around a dozen other dogs all larger than him. There was an Animal Planet television program on in the background, but none of the dogs were watching it. Instead, most of them were following Leaf around the room.

When Leaf spotted me at the plate-glass window, he ran over enthusiastically. Many of the other dogs ran to the window to get a good look at me. I got the feeling they did not want their ringleader to leave so soon.

Two men, who I presumed were employees, stood nearby and were also watching the dogs playing.

“Is that your dog?” one of them asked me. I answered yes and averted my eyes. I hoped Leaf hadn’t been chasing furry little house slippers again until they dropped from exhaustion.

“That dog is something!” said the other.

The first one said, “I’ve been watching how much fun he’s having. He’s the smallest dog in the room. But in many ways he’s the biggest dog in the room. Before he entered, the other dogs weren’t interested in playing or exploring. Your dog came in the room with an agenda.”

He added that Leaf seemed to have a method to his madness. One at a time, he’d get behind a dog and push with his nose and feet until the dog started running. Soon other dogs would join in. If they wouldn’t budge, Leaf herded them into the fray. “He made a party happen.” The man said he was so amused by Leaf’s ingenuity that he wanted to see what else this little cocker would do.

The second man chimed in. “After Leaf got most of the dogs to run and play, he wouldn’t let them rest. At one point he grabbed a tennis ball and dropped it in front of one dog who had stopped running. He tempted the dog, daring him to grab the ball. It was a challenge. The dog took Leaf’s bait and joined back in for the chase.”

I nodded and said, “Leaf herds my wife and me too. In the morning, he pushes Linda and then me with his nose and paws to the living room. That’s where we’re supposed to sit and drink our coffee. Then he goes to the front window and waits for the school bus to pick up the kids on the sidewalk across the street. After the school bus comes and goes, he jumps onto the couch and takes a nap. He makes sure all is as it should be in Leaf World.”

“I believe it,” the first man said.

At last, Leaf hurtled from the playroom’s exit door. Three other dogs tried to slip out to go with him. I placed the leash on Leaf after a hello hug. It still surprised me that he’d allow me to embrace him after all the flinching he did when we first adopted him.

He ran over to the main staff counter next and jumped up with his Elvis-lipped half-smile. Smiling back at him, the receptionist patted his head and gave him a dog biscuit, the kind he loves. “I watch him play too. He gets along with everybody in the day-care playroom,” she told me. I beamed like a proud papa.

On the way out I started checking the bags and cans of organic cat and dog food, but Leaf would have none of this and herded me toward the door. We were not adhering to the routine! When we finally made it
to the car, he immediately jumped in the backseat and settled in for a nap.

As I looked at him in the rearview mirror, I remembered the meltdown I’d had and how he had calmed me. How glad I was to see both of us making progress in healing from our traumas. Inspired by Leaf’s exuberance at doggy day care, Linda and I felt like trying something we hadn’t had the nerve to do, something to renew ourselves and our relationship. When a couple survives a severe medical crisis that involves one or the other doing the necessary caretaking, it’s important to restore balance. The next day we visited an Arthur Murray Dance Studio and signed up. Mind you, I’d never danced a day in my life.

When Linda and I had first fantasized about how everything would be different after my surgery, we had talked about taking dance lessons, but I never thought it would happen. Our work once again started spilling into our free time. Somehow things were different now. We were learning to rely on each other more for strength and creativity. We were even reminding each other to take breaks and cherish our life together. Not only as working partners but also as marriage partners.