The Dog Whisperer

by Beverly Tjerngren

I'm a dog person and I have been all my life. In my not-quite thirty-two years, I've lived a grand total of only three or four years without at least one dog, and those dog-less times were not good times for me. The longest I've ever gone at one stretch with no dog is one year, five months, and twelve days, when I first moved to Sweden and we lived in an apartment in Stockholm; as soon as we bought our house in a small northern town, I went dog-shopping. As I think my husband--not a dog person, by the way--finally understands, I simply must have a dog.

As much as I love dogs, I don't really speak their language. Having spent a lot of years with a good many dogs, I do of course have a good understanding of dog behavior, but I can't "speak" to them. I know a couple of people, including members of my own family, who can, and it's tempting for me to say that I can, too, but that would be a lie. I did, however, have an interesting experience recently that has left me feeling particularly connected to a certain dog.

On one of the last days of August last summer, my husband, our kids, and I made a trip to town to go to the Salvation Army thrift store. As we pulled into the parking lot, I saw a small-ish, furiously barking dog tied up to a light pole outside the store, and I felt instantly drawn to it. "Oooh, look at that dog!" I said to my husband, and as soon as the car stopped moving I hopped out and hurried over to the dog.

When I got close, the dog--who turned out to be a girl dog--stopped barking and started wagging her tail tentatively. I reached out a hand for her to sniff and when she gave the "all-clear" signal, I started petting her. She was a young dog, not much more than half-grown, and she was very friendly. I was instantly in love.

After a couple of minutes, my husband approached me with the kids in tow, and I said a reluctant good-bye to the dog and went in to browse around the store. The entire time we were inside I could hear the dog barking. When we left and went to a different store next-door, she was still barking. By the time we left the second store nearly an hour had passed since I first saw the dog, and she was still tied to the light pole, barking. I went back into the first store and asked the cashier there if she knew anything about the dog. She rolled her eyes and said she had no idea whose dog it was, but that she had been out there barking for well over an hour.

When I went out again, there was finally someone with the dog, a middle-aged woman, a younger woman, and a little girl. Without thinking twice, I walked straight up to them and asked if the dog was theirs. The middle-aged woman said that it was her dog, and I asked if she had ever thought about selling or giving her away. The woman was taken aback, to say the least, but after a moment she confessed, that yes, she had given it some thought. I offered to take the dog right then, but the owner said she wanted to think it over. I left her with my name and telephone number, then went to the car to confess to my waiting, non-dog-loving husband what I had done.

He was less than thrilled when he heard that I had asked a stranger for her dog, but being the even-keeled soul that he is, he just gave a resigned sigh and drove us home. When I came back to my senses I realized that I really didn't want the dog, even though I had felt compelled by something outside myself to try to get her. I already had a terrific dog, and I was enjoying the ease of being a one-dog family.

Later than evening I said a brief but earnest prayer. "God, I really don't want this dog, but if you need me to take her, I will." That was it, and when I didn't hear anything from the dog owner for a number of days, I figured my prayer had been answered. Then, five days after I had given her my number, the woman called and said she had decided I could have her dog (for the low, low price of $150). I got directions to her place, did some sighing of my own, and went down to tell my husband that we needed to go pick up our new dog.

The new dog, Lucy, blended almost seamlessly into our family, and in the four-plus months she's lived with us, I've almost forgotten that we haven't always had her. It was such a smooth transition that I didn't notice until two or three months after she came here that she isn't my kind of dog at all. Her tail is too curly, her ears are too pointy, her muzzle is too long, and she's way too skinny. Not only that, but she's quite the nervous nellie, and I'm all about calm dogs. There's not one single, rational reason why I should have been attracted to this dog, except that the called out to me. I'm not sure why she wanted to come live with me, but she did, and that's good enough for me. So, while I may not be able to talk to dogs, I think Lucy has made it pretty clear that they can talk to me.