Kindness

So, there I was at the Farm Store with the subpar customer service, buying ONLY dog food for the resident wolf girls of Spiritcreek.  (One needs weight management and the other has allergies.)  For the two different 25 pound bags of Science Diet, I expected the total cost to be $110 - $120.  When the grumpy young man rang it up, for a whopping total of $200, I was shocked.  I have been buying 38 pound bags for about $82.

"Good God Almighty!  Those dogs are going to have to start earning their keep!"  It just slipped out.

Amazingly, a young man behind me in line immediately said, "M'am, I will pay for it."

What did he say? 

I was taken aback and slightly embarrassed. I told him that was very kind of him but I was just complaining.  

He said, "I heard no complaint."

I was so shocked that I do not think I properly thanked him for his offer.  I did not accept it but was very moved just the same.    

Who does such a thing in these days of people ranting over women buying cupcakes from the bakery for their children's birthday party using SNAP cards?  

I have been praying for that young man, asking for blessings of good fortune, good health and much happiness for him.  Each time I think of it, I automatically call for blessings for him.

As for the wolf girls, those creatures of splendid canine senses, they who bark at the wind blowing, earthworms tunneling in the soil, silent and invisible extraterrestrials surveying the domicile at night, ghosts and whang doodles haunting the timber, and that most horrible monster threat of all time:  hoofbeats of the resident horses far out in the pasture!  The very same animals - German Shepherds of quality breeding - that never made a sound when a truck full of men got all the way to the front of my house, exited the truck, and circled the house.  That is how I came to be standing naked in my bedroom when I saw a man walk past the window in broad daylight.  Not a peep from those $200 dog food burners!!! 

Has Science Diet added unicorn meat to their recipes?  Pixie tears? Hobbit leaf?  

Regardless, next time I buy dog food, it is going to have to be something much less expensive. Counting on the kindness of strangers is probably not an effective budgeting practice.

 See where one particular wolf girl is stationed? 

 At all times, she finds the exact location where I need to be!  

Respect! Or not.

 Mattie, the best and most perfect German Shepherd dog in all of Northeast Kansas and Southeast Nebraska, loves me.  She recognizes my authority in all but one matter (chasing the horses).  If she is sound asleep at my feet and I make the merest move, she is instantly on her feet and ready to follow.  I try hard to not disturb her, because normally I am just going twenty feet or less away, but she gets to her feet every time.

Kenzie, the brattiest German Shepherd in all of the Central United States, parts of Canada and the northernmost edge of Mexico, does not give a rat's ass.  Even if she is in my way, she will not move a muscle.  Indeed, she will not even move her eyes in my direction.  

I wish to pass between the table and the sofa.  Kenzie is not even asleep.

I step closer, hoping she takes the hint that she is directly in my path.

I try another direction.  Notice that there is no movement whatsoever, though she is conscious and alert.

I do not even merit a side-eye.

"I am a German Shepherd, not a mere human."

The Vera Road Wolves - Field Observations

Field studies of the domesticated Vera Road wolf pack, currently consisting of two females.  Wolf #1 is approximately 64 months of age, and wolf #2 is a juvenile, approximately 17 months.  

These are the headless carcasses of the Stuffus Wieneratta, the preferred prey of the semi-domesticated black wolf.  Wolf #1 tends to leave the carcasses in an orderly arrangement, while # 2 never displays such preference.
The wolves methodically decapitate the passive stuffed wieners, and with apparent great relish tear out the squeaker.  The carcasses are carried about in the den until all entrails have been expelled and a mere empty hide remains.   

Wolf #1 is shown inspecting the Gigantic Stuffus Wieneratta, not her preferred prey.  After the population of small stuffed wieners is depleted, the giant wieners are then hunted by necessity.  

The giant stuffed wieners arranged side by side, with the much smaller stuffed wiener carcass shown for scale.  This evidence indicates the observed preference for the pink or red wieners by both wolves. Note the mangled ear of the red giant wiener but the blue giant wiener is fully intact after the same amount of time in the wolf den (8 months).  

The demise of the red Gigantic Stuffus Wieneratta observed in the field 5:30 am, August 15, 2022. While the head remains intact, the brains have been removed and spread about the den by wolf #2.  Even for a dispassionate observer, the brave grin of the blue giant stuffed wiener is hard to bear.

The Vera Road Wolves

Wolf #2 on the left, wolf #1 on the right. Sleeping mattresses are not shared but no violence has ever been observed over food or possession of either the stuffed wieners or the gigantic stuffed wieners.

Living With the Descendants of Wolves

 My days are now spent in companionship with two black wolves.  Well, they are not genuinely wolves but everyone knows that dogs are descended from wolves - and German Shepherds still resemble wolves - and likely still act somewhat like wolves. 

Mattie is 4 years old and her half sister Kenzie is 1 year old.  They are related by having the same incredible sire.  German Shepherds all share some traits - the main one being high intelligence.  Their genetics dictate that they work with their human being, checking in every little bit to make sure their work is progressing and acceptable to the human.  So, even when endeavoring in an action not sanctioned - such as chasing the horses - German Shepherds turn to look to their human.  Of course, I am yelling and cussing like a sailor.  The dogs apparently assume I am exceedingly happy with their effort.  

While so alike in countless ways, the sisters are very different in personality.  In the house, Mattie is ladylike, careful, obedient, meticulous in her manners.  She does not make a mess when she eats or drinks.  She can be sound asleep by my feet but if I so much as move a muscle, she is instantly awake and on her feet, ready to travel to the kitchen or whatever adventure I have planned in my superior human wisdom.  She is beautiful.  Her face and ears are more foxy and more refined than her sister.

Kenzie is big, raw boned, and as gangly as a timber wolf.  Her ears are absolutely German Shepherd ears - enormous.  Kenzie eats noisily, and sloppily laps up water, leaving the floor wet in an enormous area around the bowl.  Everything she does is head-on, nose first, matter of fact.  Though she knows I am supposed to be the boss, in her estimation I am absolutely not qualified.  She does acquiesce to me but never immediately. Everything is accomplished in her time and choosing.  If I am slow to get up in the morning, she has no problem sticking her cold nose on my foot or arm or whatever body part she can reach.  If I am ever inattentive, she will flat-out poke me with her nose and crowd into my space because, as a human, I am quite stupid and slow - maybe one of the slowest humans she has ever encountered.  

If Kenzie is lying awake on the floor and I get up from my chair, she does not move.  She will not turn her head.  She will not even move her eyes toward me.  It is perfectly acceptable to Kenzie for me to step over her long, sleek body.  She simply lies there, entirely relaxed.  When Mattie is asleep, I try to move quietly, try not to disturb her.  But at the first movement, Mattie is on her feet and out of my way, ready to follow.  

If they were allowed their freedom, they would wander far from home.  Mattie has followed the creek westward several times, being away from home longer each time.  I assumed she was exploring further each time.  I would actively look for her, driving for miles, calling for her.  Too many dangers for a black wolf dog!  Chasing cattle could get her shot on sight.  There are hunters who set traps for fur-bearing animals in this county.  There are bob cats, and a remote possibility of a cougar. Traffic, coyotes, old barbed wire tangles everywhere along the creek and in the timber.  She could not be allowed to wander.  Sadly, it meant she had to be tied up if I could not be outside with her.  This was very unfortunate and made me feel bad for her.  Finally, this year, I had a five-foot chain link fence erected behind the house, 40 feet by 60 feet.  It is enough room for the wolf sisters to run and play safely.  It also prevents the dogs from herding the horses out of the corral and into the pasture.

Kenzie seems content to stay within sight of the house.  She will follow Mattie if I let both of them out at the same time, but if Kenzie is alone, she stays close by.  I was watching her from the front window the other day.  She was a good forty yards away, following some intriguing scent she had found in the leaves.  I wondered just how sensitive her hearing was.  I spoke her name in a very quiet voice.  A human in another room in the house would not have heard me.  Kenzie heard and immediately stopped to give me the German Shepherd stare:  body absolutely still - ears and eyes hyper-focused on me.  I quietly said "Come, Kenzie." She heard, all that distance, through the glass, and came running.  Amazing.

Mattie is convinced the two horses are dangerous killers that must be kept far away from the house and certainly away from the human.  She will race along the corral, hackles up, teeth bared, ferociously barking.  If the horses ignore this horrible warning, she will dip under the fence to chase the killer equines away.  She goes right to their back hooves, snapping and snarling.  I practically perish each time this happens.  One kick and Mattie would be terribly damaged or dead.  The horses are peace- loving creatures and apparently understand that the pain-in-the-ass dogs live here, too.  They tolerate the dogs with remarkable good grace, but their ancient mustang genes certainly recognize the threat of wolves at their heels.  They rush away from Mattie, tails high, manes flying.  I do everything in my power to prevent this from happening but sometimes Mattie gets away.

Alone, Kenzie apparently wants to be friends with the horses, not chasing or barking at them.  If Mattie is barking and threatening, then Kenzie will half-heartedly join in.  I saw her hanging on Wally's tail the other day, and almost passed out.  Wally amazingly accepted this foolishness as play and ignored the dog.  Mattie thinks she is protecting me but Kenzie would not care if the horses kill me.  Poor Mattie has to watch confined in the fence when I go into the corral to tend the supreme beings.  Mattie paces and whines, and makes the most remarkable noises of distress as she watches horses and human walk toward the barn, side-by-side.  To Mattie it must seem as if the human will be killed right before her very eyes while she is helplessly constrained by a mesh of wire and metal poles.   

People say things, like, "I'll bet no one will give you any trouble with those two Shepherds here!"  I do not know what would happen if someone actually tried to cause some harm.  These are two gentle, loving beings who do not know yet that humans can be mean and dangerous.  They are sensible dogs, not prone to dog hysteria or senseless barking.  They rarely bark in the house and never in the car.  If they bark at night, it is because there is some critter - probably a host of critters - moving about under the cover of darkness.  I guess if a maniac tries to come uninvited into the house, we will all find out together what the Shepherds will do.

Otherwise, if I am at the computer, or painting, or watching tv, the dogs are asleep at my feet.  Their quiet satisfaction in simply being fills my home with peace and tranquility.  If I could still hike the creek and the prairie, we would go happily, as a small pack - they the descendants of wolves and me the descendant of hunters.  As dogs, they retain the most valuable quality of wolves, that being their love and loyalty to their family.

Mattie

Kenzie

Baby Mattie

Baby Kenzie

Wolf Sisters playing tug of war

Grave Mistakes

Spending almost all my time alone due to the pandemic allows me to reflect deeply on my ordinary life.  A pitfall of not interacting in-person with others is that, as a human being, I begin to assume that I must be the brightest, most intelligent person - EVER!  Fortunately, some natural law of equilibrium continues to operate on the ego, even in the pandemic isolation.  The world has its ways to assure that no human becomes so self-aggrandizing as to ever again attempt a tower of Babel.

After years of various desperate struggles to make certain my horses have enough water in the winter, I finally landed on a brilliant idea of a corral between the barn and house.  It would be a permanent structure that would allow the horses to come down to a water tank within about 50 feet from a water faucet and electrical outlets. I would only need a 50 foot garden hose - not 350 feet.  I was so proud of this solution.  

I thought the horses would simply wear a path through the tall grass that grew between the barn and yard.  And that might have happened if the first winter had not been nothing but mud - all winter long.  And if the second winter had not been nothing but mud - all winter long.  The horses have almost entirely obliterated all vegetation in a wide swath.  It took an enormous effort to get that ground planted back to prairie so I grieve the loss of all that beautiful big bluestem.  It also meant that I have to slog through slippery and deep mud all the way from the gate to the barn where the hay is.  I hate it.

I also knew that rain run-off naturally drained from the pasture in the long low point running between the house and the barn.  But when the sun was shining and the ground handily covered in restored thick, vibrant prairie, I arrogantly proclaimed:  "Place the royal fence here, along the lowest level of drainage!"  Well, actually, I wanted the fence closer to the house but the fence guy moved it to the low spot.  Both of us are goddamned geniuses!  If the fence had been moved just 6 feet further uphill, during the winters, the grass of the yard would have covered that long drainage slough.  There would still be bare ground on the other side but not standing water and deep mud that sucks the boots off my feet.  

The denuded hill is also an eyesore this close to the house.  I think one solution will be to fence the horses out of it from spring to fall this year and give the vegetation a chance to recover.  It will mean more garden hose but in warm weather that is not a problem.  We will see.

In the cold dark days of January, 2020, I was perusing the website of the breeder where I got Mattie, my German Shepherd.  I had two dogs then:  Mattie and Jake.  By the summer of 2020, I would have had knee surgery and have a new lease on life by the time my name came up on the list for a puppy.  (The breeder has a long, long waiting list for puppies.)

Living with three dogs was possible.  I live on almost 30 acres.  My neighbor has 4 dogs at any given time. She is roughly my age and they haven't turned on her like ravening wolves yet!  Wouldn't another adorable German Shepherd puppy, just like my Good Dog Mattie, be wonderful?  In the cold, windy, late-winter night, I succumbed to the siren call of puppies, filling out a contract and sending a sizable non-refundable deposit for a sister to Mattie.

Then came the pandemic making elective surgery out of the question for me.  I am too old to chance getting covid 19.  I had almost forgotten about the puppy until I received a call late in November that I had first choice of the females in the litter.  Oh.  Oh, I say!  It was not a good time for a puppy.  I probably should have passed and opted for a later litter but it was awfully late to do that to the breeder.  But, my poor ol' Jake had passed away during the summer.  In keeping with his life of misfortune and injury, one of the horses stepped on his foot, crushing the bones.  The vet kept him and tried to gently heal his foot without expensive surgery.  While in the veterinarian hospital, Jake unexpectedly died.  Even though my grief for Jake was still fresh, the idea of a puppy did not seem outrageous right then.  So, enter Miss Kenzie.

Yes, it was a brilliant idea for a crippled old woman to get an energetic German Shepherd puppy late in the year!  Mattie was easily kennel trained but Kenzie is STILL not house trained.  She had no problem soiling her kennel day one, so the effective aid a kennel can be in house training was rendered useless on the first day.  In addition to these difficulties, I suffered through an extended period of time when the "misery was upon me".  I do not know what causes this illness.  I do not run a fever nor have a head or stomach ache.  I simply feel terrible and need to stay in bed.  It is all I can do to force myself to look after my horses when this hits me.  I have learned to manage this suffering with scalding hot baths and long naps until it passes.  With a puppy those long naps were out of the question.  Getting up three or four times a night almost killed me.  Literally.  I was not depressed but during the worst of constantly cleaning up both puppy and kennel, I thought if I die right now, I will not be mad.

It is in the contract that if for any reason I no longer wanted the puppy, I was to return her to the breeder.  I seriously considered this option.  But, I would be playing with Kenzie, teaching her new tricks, and watching her blast around on those impossibly big paws.  Her comically enormous ears deployed, making her look like a fruit bat, and knew I could not give her up.  She is so smart!  She knows these commands already:  sit, down, look at me, touch nice (instead of snapping food out of my hands) place, heel, and is learning wait and stay.  I know that my inability to get around quickly enough has impeded the house breaking.

So, right now my beautiful wood floors are covered in muddy paw prints from both dogs.  I have to keep one outside and one inside because as soon as they are in the house together, they thunder through the small rooms, knocking stuff over or down.  The only safe way for both of them to be in the house together is for Kenzie to be in the kennel.  How awful it is going to be when Kenzie is full grown?  Mattie weighed 6 pounds when I brought her home at 8 weeks - over three years later, she weighs 75.  Kenzie weighed 13 and 1/2 at 8 weeks!  Her paws are as big as the palms of my hands.  She is going to be much larger than Mattie when full grown.  Mattie by herself is quiet, obedient, careful in the house.  Kenzie is not.  So, looking into the near future, I see a fenced yard of some nature.  I hate to fence in my house.  I love the wide open spaces.  But two German Shepherds who look exactly like black wolves running loose is a bad thing in cattle country.

Stupid old woman! Not smart at all.  If I had discussed the corral idea with a smart person - someone at least incrementally smarter than either myself or the fence guy, I might not be slogging through 6" deep mud and cussing myself blue in the face day and night on the way to and from the barn!

If I had the benefit of serious adult feedback, I may have avoided the overpowering allure of a puppy at this time in my life!

On the other hand... I have never taken anyone else's advice on something once I have made up my mind.  I just pay the price for being stupidly stubborn. 

With such large ears, you would think they could locate without turning their head.  First left...

Then far right, for good measure!

Kenzie "placing" on the towel.  She does this without a towel, in the car, even outside...for a minute!

3 months and 2 weeks old today.  Look at the size of those paws!