Driving home from the market last week Jan saw the big gathering in the fields of the Junior High School. The sign said, “Del Monte Dog Show,” and it looked like an event with dozens of tents and paddocks for dogs to prance around. Jan instantly said. “Dog Show! I wanna go.” So we went home and unloaded our groceries and went back to mount a scouting expedition to determine what we could see.
Jan has always loved dogs and to this day she loves them. She is not a show dog person… or so I thought but at this large gathering of dogs and people she sought out other people and talked with them about a lot of different topics. She came back from one such conversation and said, “I love dog people…” which kind of surprised me.
This was a fancy dog show. People dressed up for it and the dogs were regal in bearing and appearance. So too their owners. Lots of people were wearing what I would consider “Court Clothes” that is dresses, and sports coats, no leather, no piercings, no visible tattoos… with some notable exceptions… that is when people had any tattoos they had a lot of them and showed them proudly. This seemed to be a trait for the Staffordshire Terrier enthusiasts. Which kind of made sense to me because if there were a breed of dog who would be proud of tattoos it would be Staffordshire terriers. Anyway it seemed that fancy dog show people are fancy people.
Jan and Arthur at the fancy dog show. Arthur is holding his stuffed dog named Puppy.
What surprised me was that fancy dog show people are very friendly. They apparently love to talk about their dogs and everything about their breeds, from blood lines, grooming tips, behavior to long term trends in characteristics. “It really is almost shocking how golden retrievers are trending to being shorter legged than the ‘classic look’.
Jan who is generally shy and not fancy at all ran right over to a woman leading a Beauceron and started chatting with her as if they had gone to high school together. The woman was lovely and so friendly. She had brought her dog over from France which is where the breed originated and is still quite popular. Our dog Dot is a Beauceron and I thought I was going to have to drag Jan away before they closed down the park.
Three things really interested me about the show.One was how important the grooming element was and how much specialized gear was involved. I saw three huge RV style trucks with several what I’d call grooming salons that popped out on the side. Generators were on, tables slid out, and dogs leashed in to proper looking stations where men and women combed, brushed and trimmed different breeds, apparently all day long. Most of these groomers were professionals who sometimes doubled as handlers to display the dogs in the ring. The dogs no matter what the breed looked immaculate and the best of the dogs seemed to know they were beautiful, just by the way they moved. Some moved like super models turning with a snap and loping next to their handlers as if they were going for an audition to appear on Broadway.
But what interested me most was how people talked to the dogs. The trainers were very professional, with sharp commands and steady serious encouragement. “Good Boy, Lovely now Nice turn!”
The owners tended toward baby talk, with the smaller the breed tending to be more babyish. That some of these dogs appear to be surrogate children seemed obvious to me. Others spoke in a surprisingly companionable tone. “You are a beautiful boy, aren’t you. Are you hungry? Can I get you something?” I could imagine the one sided conversations while traveling to the show. Friends talking about where they will stay and what to expect. “This is Carmel. Are you looking forward to seeing Miss Piggy? It will be nice to see her again. Don’t you think?”
I comment on this without a trace of judgement. Because I have always had weird ways of talking to dogs, and so does Jan.
Jan talks to her dogs as if they were siblings: Jokey and sometimes with sarcasm. (which is the way she most often talks with her siblings.) “Dot, you are a big oaf. This is a single bed and you want to come up here only when I am in the bed first.” She says this as she is making room for Dot to squeeze in to her hospital sized bed to watch TV for hours together. “You big oaf. You are such a pain in the butt.” as she pats and snuggles with her.
I talk to Dot as if she were a visiting professor for someplace known for erudition. “Now Dot, I understand and appreciate that you would want to bark at that dog across the street, but we can see that that the dog poses no threat to us right now and there is no need to bark. Thank you for your concern but really there is no need to bark in this circumstance.” I believe that Dot enjoys it when I talk this way, she stares at me and looks quizzical as if she has no fricking idea of what I’m saying. But she does not bark… usually.
This is Dot, not understanding a word I say.
I have long ago accepted that we project the type of companion we want on to our dogs. It’s natural I suppose. It seemed more natural when ancient herders really needed dogs to be fierce towards animals threatening to the heard and the conversation was more akin to, “Kill the Bear, Dot… go kill the bear.” Now we talk with our dog companions as if we had met while applying for a job at a junior college..
My old boss when I was a kid, had a working dog named Bob who he treated in a very business like manner. “Bob, come here. I really want you to run over there and get that bull out of that bog. Do you see the bull over there Bob? Now move him out of there and on up the hill.” He would point and I’m sure that was helpful. But then Bob would run over to the bull and bark and bite until the Bull pulled himself up out of the bog. What my boss wanted in Bob was a helper and that’s how he spoke. Jan wants a sibling and a friend and that’s how she speaks to Dot. Me I want to be friends with a rather priggish Oxford Don and thats how I speak to my friend Dot.
I suppose the most important thing is that we keep trying to try and bridge the gap between human beings and animals. It can seem silly but I also think that making that connection does in fact make us all the more human: that we are strong, empathetic and loving. Not to mention the fact that most of what we communicate comes from tone of voice and body language. Which, I suspect is a good reminder for all our interactions as people.
Here is a poem I wrote a while ago.
