Testing My Independence
On April the ninth, I will be nine months old and Doc decided it was time to give me some more independence. That was her first mistake. Her next mistake was giving me a second chance. It’s been fourteen years since she raised a puppy and apparently she has forgotten how long puppy brain lasts.
On Saturday Doc realized she should mow the lawn for the first time. Since rain was in the forcast, she knew she needed to get it done, as it was getting long. . She decided that this may be the perfect time to let me stay in the house unsupervised while she was just outside where I could see her. When Doc went outside without me, I can’t deny, I got a little nervous. I heard her start up the mower and then I saw her through the window in the front yard going back and forth. Everything was ok until she went into the side yard where I couldn’t see her anymore. I admit that that was when I got a little nervous and when I decided to look around for something to chew on for comfort. The closest thing to me was Doc’s area rug in the dining room with the fringe on the end. For a puppy, nooking (suckling) on something helps us deal with anxiety. So that’s what I did until Doc came back into the house.
Now Doc never saw me sucking on the fringe, so she thought everything went swimingly and gave me all sorts of high praise for being a big brave boy. She even went on this long diatribe about the scientific research showing that she needed to give me space to develop my own identity and learn to self sooth when she wasn’t around. I’d like to know who those scientists were, they probably don’t raise puppies outside of the test sight or they would know better. Anyway, on Sunday she gave me another chance, when she went outside to clean up the flower beds and you guessed it, I went right to the rug fringe again. It was looking rather gnarly by this point, so I was suprised she hadn’t noticed. But, when Monday rolled around, It just so happened that Doc walked through the dining room in her bare feet to adjust the thermostat when she felt the dampness on her feet. You see, I had continued sucking on that rug when Doc wasn’t looking, so it stayed pretty damp.
To my surprise, she didn’t get too bent out of shape, she just asked me what I thought was an obvious question. “Walter have you been sucking on the fringe of the rug?” Really? Like how does she think it got wet? That there is somebody breaking in our house when we are at work and just sucking on the fringe and leaving? You have to admit that sometimes you humans ask us some strange questions.
So, was it too soon to give me some independence? No, Doc decided I needed it or how else would I learn. But, she did it with some more boundaries. Now she has gates up so I can’t get in the dining room and I have been fine. Now she leaves my stuffed monkey out to comfort me. I carry it around like a baby with a pacifier and it keeps me calm. Independence, here I come!