Older Dog Wisdom - Tux 28: Mama's Lessons

As Tux, Grace, and I rounded the bend of the park path, we came face to face with a gaggle of geese sunning themselves in the outfield of one of the baseball field. There must have been a dozen of the big birds resting there. One goose, apparently the designated perimeter guard, started waddling toward us. 

Tux was stunned. He’d never seen a creature as large as this one who didn’t have four feet. Sure, he knew what birds were. Hadn’t he chased Robins and Cardinals out of his yard for years? But these creatures? They couldn’t possibly be birds - they were way too large. How could they possibly get off the ground? I didn’t have the heart to remind him that he’d flown in a jet - twice - and it was much larger than any of these geese. He and the jet had managed to stay in the air for fifteen hours without a problem.

What did the intrepid hunter do next? Why he went into his three-point stance, of course. Then he began to stalk the guard goose, placing one foot ever so slowly in front of the other as he began his approach.

The goose, for his part, couldn’t believe the audacity of the Cocker Spaniel - intrepid hunter or no. He quacked once alerting his fellows that there was an intruder. Several goose heads swiveled in our direction.

Grace, on the other hand, simply sat down to watch the unfolding drama. By now, she’d seen her brother stalk a wadded up piece of paper, a fallen tree branch, three crazy daschunds, and even a drooling devil dog which had attacked us. She wasn’t sure how this would play out, but she knew it would be amusing.

I kept thinking of all the stories I’d heard about geese being used as watchdogs and attacking intruders of their turf. While the baseball field could hardly be called their turf, if possession is 99% of the law, we were on their turf. How was I going to get Tux and Grace out of harm’s way if the geese attacked? I had no answer to that question.

Luckily for all concerned, nature called. Tux lost his bad-dog attitude and look when he squatted to pee. Somehow a male dog squatting to pee just doesn’t send the right vibe to a militant goose.

The geese all took to the sky suddenly. Apparently, break was over and they needed to return to the business of flying northward. There was much flapping of wings and honking both of which startled Tux. He actually ducked as the guard goose flew over his head. I was most grateful that the geese didn’t have a call of nature. The image of 12 geese pooping on our heads wasn’t a pleasant one.

Lesson Learned

Before you decide to be a tough guy make sure you remember you mama’s lessons about using the bathroom before embarking on a journey.

Older Dog Wisdom #8 - Become an Alpha Author

Tux’s Sister Grace
Although seldom mentioned in these blogs, Tux has a sister, Grace. While he is parti-colored, she is black with a blaze of white on her chest and white on the pads of her rear feet. She’s petite, looks dainty, but she’s a tomboy at heart: she has never seen a puddle she didn’t go through the middle of, a patch of mud she’s never walked around, or a pat on the head she’s ever passed up. And she is a leader by nature.

Tux on the other hand has always been much more fastidious. He walks around puddles and leaps over patches of mud. He, too, is gregarious and loves to be petted (although as he ages, he’s less inclined to accept gratuitous pets).

An Alpha Challenge
Grace, has always been the alpha dog in the family. She has always been in charge. She’s always led the way outside. She chose the way to go in the park - left or right. Lately, though, Tux has begun to test her rule. Slowly, over the last year or so, Tux has been testing the waters of being alpha dog. He still has trouble making a decision about which way to go on a walk, but given enough time to think it over, he’ll make a decision. He has, however, taken over leading them out of doors.

Gracie’s been hurt, and while she's recuperating, Tux has assumed her role as the alpha dog. He now takes the lead in all things. He’s not aggressive, not even very assertive. He accidently stepped on his sister’s injured paw in his hurry to get the door to lead them outside. He was immediately contrite - so much for his image as Mr. Macho.

Tux has also become our protector against trash-talking daschunds, teenaged boy dogs who say rude things to Grace, and any dog who looks hard at his sister.

A Coup in the House
Tux no longer says that he can’t be the alpha dog. He no longer says he doesn’t know how to be the alpha dog. He woke up one morning and said, “I’m going to be the alpha dog.” And he did. There had been a coup while Grace and I weren’t paying attention.

Lesson Learned from Tux
As writers, we need to learn from Tux. We need to learn to wake up every morning and say, “Today is the day that I become an author.” On that day, start that novel you’ve always wanted to write. Become the author you’ve always wanted to be. Take your writing to the next level. It won’t be easy and there will be some missteps along the way. Perhaps, like Tux, if we say we’re an author often enough, we’ll really start thinking it’s true.

Tux as Alpha
Tux has declared that not all alpha dogs have to walk through puddles and mud. He still goes around them - he hates being dirty. As for Grace and I, we have a hard time thinking of Tux as an alpha dog since he still squats to pee.

Older Dog Wisdom 4

Walking with Tux

While out for our morning walk, Tux, my 10-year-old male dog, was prancing along when he suddenly stopped dead in his tracks. He brought his left front leg up and stared hard down the sidewalk. I looked where he was looking, but saw nothing that should have put him on alert. He began stalking the object. We moved down the sidewalk one slow step at a time. I kept trying to figure out what had captured his attention, but still didn’t see anything. He was stepping down the sidewalk very carefully, trying hard not to alert his quarry to his presence. I guess it didn’t occur to him that he was with me and surely whatever he was stalking would see me before it saw Tux. Be be that as it may, the two of us were stalking something only Tux could see.

Finally, Tux sped up. Then I saw what he had seen. At first, I thought it was a squirrel, but it wasn’t moving. Then I thought maybe it was Mr. & Mrs. Mallard, but they haven’t returned from their summer vacation yet. Then I was sure it was a bunny. As we got closer, Tux sped up again. He put his nose to the ground and we were moving down the sidewalk at a fast clip.

Then it happened. Tux stepped on his ear and almost went ass over teakettle. It took all my self-control not to laugh out loud. After he recovered his equilibrium, he looked around to see if anyone had seen him stumble. There was no one but us. So we moved along.

The object of his attention turned out to be a twig with its leaves still attached. Once he ascertained that it was a bunch of leaves, he proceeded to a small planted area where he knew bunnies usually hang out as if to convince me that he’d been stalking a bunny and not a bunch of leaves.

Tux’s Lesson

The lesson Tux taught me was to keep my eye on my goal so that I don’t get distracted and careen off track.

That lesson is often a hard one for writers. There are so many stories in our heads clamoring to be told that sticking with one for 75,000 words can be hard. I have several started projects that need to be finished. Someday, I tell myself, I’ll return to them and finish them. I tell myself if I don’t at least start the story, I may forget the idea. While that may be true, writing 5,000 words and then setting them aside means there are 5,000 fewer words in the novel I currently have 45,000 words written.

How Do You Track Story Ideas?

How do you track the story ideas running around in your head? Do you write the idea down somewhere and hope you remember where? Or do you start the story and set it aside until it’s time to spend the time finishing it?

Old Dog, New Lessons #3

A friend joined me in walking my dog, Tux, in our local park the other day. When she noticed me glancing at him often, she asked, “What are you looking for?”

I had to think a moment because, while I knew I checked on him often, I wasn’t really aware of what, exactly, I was looking for.

I told her that I was looking for a hitch in his gait as he walked, I looked to make sure he wasn’t limping, I wanted to see if he was at the end of his lead or was he walking closer to me (which tells me he’s not feeling well), and I wanted to ensure he didn’t pick up something he shouldn’t. It was on one of our walks, as I checked on him, that I first realized that Tux was losing his hearing. He was no longer responding to a dog barking in a nearby neighborhood or a child screaming in delight as his mother pushed him in a swing.

After we got home, I began thinking about our walks. I noted that what I look for in Tux every morning is the same thing that I look for in my first edit of a completed manuscript. Once I finish writing a manuscript, I get it printed out. The things I’m looking for in that first edit are the same things I look for in Tux.

• Is there a hitch in my writing? Does my writing flow or are there hitches in it? I think of a hitch in my writing as something that will stop a writer dead in her tracks or anything that will distract the reader.

• Is my writing limping? If the story isn’t moving along, it is limping. If the reader isn’t turning the pages like her hair is on fire, then the writing is limping.

• Am I moving along at a leisurely pace and not at the end of my lead? I want my story to feel vigorous and eager. I want the reader to want to know what’s going to happen next.

• Finally, I want to make sure there that I hadn’t put something into the manuscript that would stick in a reader’s mind as an irritant throughout the story. I want to make sure there are no loose ends. Did one of my characters promise to do something on page 26 and at the end of the book, that promise was still not kept?

Tux is an old dog who prefers to be called “older” rather than old because the word “old” has such negative connotations in this country. Regardless of whether he is old or older, he is still able to teach me new tricks, and he brings joy to my life because he finds joy in his.

Old Dog, New Lessons

In August, I posted about learning lessons from my ten-year-old Cocker Spaniel, Tux.

I learned another lesson from Tux a couple of weeks ago. We were out walking when a small dog started carrying on from his place of safety behind his chain link fence. Tux was okay with the frenetic activity of the small dog running back and forth trying to provoke Tux. When the other dog stopped and started barking and talking trash, it was more than Tux could stand and he took umbrage.

I was sure Tux would, at the very least, lunge at the other dog. No. What he did was to stop and look hard at the trash-talking mutt. Then Tux turned his head away and approached his sister who had been watching the interaction between the two males.

In the doggie equivalent of a high five, he walked over to his sister and gently touched noses with her. I’ve only seen him do this once before, and under similar circumstances. It was as if he were saying that he was the bigger dog for walking away and his sister was agreeing with him, and, indeed, was proud of him for doing that.

How many times have we allowed ourselves to be provoked into action by someone else’s words only to rue the reaction to those fighting words? I, myself, allowed myself to get provoked the other day when we were walking in a park that posted that all dogs have to be on leashes. When we rounded a bend in the sidewalk, a man was coming toward us and his dog was off leash. Knowing Tux as I do, I called to the man to please leash his dog. He ignored me. So I called to him again to leash his dog. His response was not to leash his dog, but to continue to advance on us. By this time, Tux, too, was being provoked because he knows it is his duty to protect his sister and his Mom and here was an unleashed dog heading toward us. Finally, in my best school teacher voice, I ordered “Leash your dog.”

Finally, the man tried to do just that. Not that his dog went to him when he was called. The man had to chase down his undisciplined dog, which, of course, amused me no end to see an overweight arrogant man chasing a dog around in circles. He did get his dog on a leash and as we passed one another on the path, with his dog growling and snarling, Tux had had enough and lunged at the other dog. He and I both knew that because I had him on a short leash, nothing would happen. But neither the man nor his dog knew that. The dog was totally intimidated. So, too, was the man.

I couldn’t help but mutter as we passed, “Keep your damned dog on a leash in the park.” His response was a snarled juvenile retort, “You don’t own this park.”

I know better than to allow people to provoke me. Nothing is served by it. While there was momentary satisfaction on my part for having spoken up, the interchange did nothing to change the man’s attitude that he didn’t need to obey the leash laws, that he was special, and the laws weren’t meant for him.

So now, I simply do what I have to do to protect Tux and his sister as well as myself from harm. If it’s turning and going in the opposite direction of the unleashed dog, we will do that.

Luckily, though, I’ve not seen that man and his in my park again.

Learning New Tricks or What an Old Dog Can Teach Us

Tux and the Bush

I have a male dog named Tux (his name has been changed so the other dogs at the park won’t mock him). The other day we were out for our morning walk in the park. As we passed a bush, he paused, lifted his leg, and did his thing.

So what? You may ask. No big deal, you say. Ah, but it was a big deal. Tux is ten years old. He’s never, ever lifted his leg before.

What Are the Lessons for Tux?

Old dogs do learn new tricks. Tux is living proof of that. He took a risk that

1. He wouldn’t fall over,
2. He could perform his duty like a male, and
3. No one would make fun of him.

Luckily, there was no one around to see him except me, and I was too stunned to say a word (I did, however, give a fist pump when his back was turned).

Why did he do it? My guess is that because he’d been talking trash with three rude dachshunds over the last few months and his manhood had been impugned. He was determined to prove he was, indeed, macho. He only needed to lift his leg once to prove his point.

I didn’t want to ask how the mouthy dachshunds knew he’d lifted his leg, but I suspect that he didn’t need to prove his manhood to them because he’d proven it to himself. They probably knew right away by the way he swaggered up to them.

What Are the Lessons for You and I?

There are three lessons that you and I can take away from this episode.

1. If you’re going to take a risk, minimize the consequences.
2. You needn’t prove anything to anyone but yourself.
3. Take pride in whatever you do.

Taking a risk is hard we all know that. It can be scary as hell under the best of circumstances and terrifying under good circumstances. Sometimes, though, we need to risk in order to advance, to feel alive, to prove to ourselves that we can.

It would be wonderful if every risk we take paid huge dividends. But they don’t. Some risks turn out to be unmitigated disasters. Ignore the naysayers in your life. You’ve proven to yourself that you can and will take a risk for what you want.

If the risk you take turns out to be a complete disaster, don’t hang your head as if you did something bad. You didn’t. You did what you thought was best at the time you did it. So hold your head high. You are a risk taker. Take pride in that because so many others play it safe all the time.

Pride and Panache

Tux hasn’t bothered to lift his leg again. He’s returned to squatting like a girl, but now he does it with pride and panache.