I was walking Catherine the Great (now part of our family: introduction, recent update) one evening when my neighbor friend, David, walked by. He's a tall Black guy with an extremely impressive Afro. We struck up a friendship as we've kept seeing each other in the neighborhood. I see him walking through our neighborhood a lot in the evening, because he takes Tri-Rail up from his job at a university in Miami-Dade County.
Catherine does not like David. I'm not entirely sure why. She doesn't seem to have a problem with Black people in general, and she seems to have a problem with some white people just the same. Catherine started barking in that menacing, guard-dog way she has. I would not want to mess with this dog when she's behaving like that.
I sat down next to her on the asphalt, and she laid down next to me. I got her attention away from David, talked to her, sternly but in a normal tone of voice, and told her that she should stop barking, because David was a friend of mine, he wasn't going to hurt me, and he wasn't going to hurt her. (I'm not even sure I told her that David wasn't going to hurt her, because I don't think it would have mattered.) I didn't try to discourage her from defending me in general, mind you: I was very direct with her, saying that David was a friend of mine.
She stopped barking and calmed down, immediately. I could tell from her relaxed body language that she was no longer in guard-dog mode. (I didn't even see if her hackles had been up; when she's in guard-dog mode, they're obvious.)
So I asked David to move closer. He did. (I have to thank him for trusting me, and Catherine, but I did tell him that I had Catherine by her regular leash, the short leash I keep on her harness because her harness has no handle, and directly by her harness.)
He approached, and kept approaching. He came up to a couple of feet away from Catherine and me. Catherine acted the way she would when someone she was okay with walked up to her—completely chill.
I asked him to give her one of her high-value treats, and he agreed. I handed him the bag. He took one out, and brought his hand pretty close to Catherine. Catherine did her usual springing-for-a-treat thing— not menacing, but faster than you would think an 8-year-old bulldog could do. It didn't faze him. That was all Catherine did. All.
After I sat down and talked to Catherine about David, her whole affect changed, like night and day. I've often said that one reason we bonded is that I sat on the floor with her and talked to her from the first day she was at our house, when I was dog-sitting her. Early in our acquaintance, I bought a legless chair. It has a little padding and a back, and is designed to sit on the floor. it's a little cushier than sitting on the tiles. I've spent a lot of time in that chair. (Other than her paws, It's Catherine's favorite object to lick in the house… other than me. I don't think that's a coincidence.)
Catherine has done similar things, but not this dramatic a change. When she barks at someone behind our house, sometimes, I'll let her barker a few times. Listening to her low menacing bark gives me a twinge of atavistic fear—and a bit of Schadenfreude for a hypothetical burglar. Then, I sit on the floor with her, and tell her it's okay, she protected the house, she doesn't have to worry about anything. She calms down immediately.
Either Catherine understands English, or she's preternaturally in tune with my tone. (Not everyone's, I think. She doesn't pay attention to Becky nearly as much or as well, even though she has known Becky as long as she has known me.)
I love this dog. Her previous guardians offered to let me adopt her when they were moving away. They could see that I had a better bond with her than they did. Becky was unsure if it would work out or whether she was on board with this, I cried over this dog, not as an attempt to influence Becky, but at the thought of losing Catherine.
When I was a kid, I cried a lot, as kids do. My parents made fun of me. As medical parents, they said that my tear ducts were connected to my kidneys. (I'm sure that came from my father. Long story.) So, I don't cry. Not "I don't cry easily," I don't cry at all. I cried over this dog. Becky said in the almost 27 years we've been together, she'd never seen me cry.
So, you can see my love and concern for this dog. I've known for a while that she loves and cares about me.
But I am continually amazed at just how deep that bond goes… in both directions.
As I have said a lot, for any number of reasons, on any number of occasions, "This dog, I tell you."
