Tag: dog behavior

Bertha And The Blueberry Country Club For Cats

Bertha And The Blueberry Country Club For Cats

Some ideas spring unbidden, leap into consciousness with indelible impact, embed themselves so resolutely as to be impervious to the ordinary tidal pull of memories saved and memories lost.

Such was my experience in overhearing a seemingly competent woman release a torrent of vituperation toward a person named Bertha, apparently the owner or manager of an enterprise known as The Blueberry Country Club for Cats.  Propriety demanded that I quietly withdraw from the blast zone, lest my uninvited observation of the dismembering of Bertha’s character add even greater impetus to the roiling disaffection for Bertha and, I supposed, her disgruntlement with the Blueberry Country Club, and perhaps with cats.

I longed to know more of Bertha’s betrayal; had there been simple mismanagement of cat care, an unhappy encounter with a particular cat or band of cats?  Surely the misstep, Bertha’s I guessed, had been singularly egregious to warrant the amount of venom sprayed in the few seconds of immoderate recrimination I had witnessed.  I longed to eavesdrop until the details of the battle became clear.  Stories are all about us; I am shameless in appropriating stories and sensed that at least two or three could be tapped from title, “Bertha and the Blueberry Country Club For Cats”.

I could take the obvious path and invent a story about a sensitive girl from Nebraska, young Bertha, daughter of hardworking beet farmers, simple folks not afraid of hard work and fond of beets.   I could give her kind and loving parents, well-meaning but unable to imagine a world beyond the confines of farm and vegetables.  Chafing at the strictures of life on the prairie and comforted only by her cat, Blueberry, and the books she’s found at the local library, the clever girl finds herself in Lincoln, a graduate of the University, poised and at ease, she thinks, in the company of the city’s elite.  Invited to balls and galas at the snazzy Husker Club, Bertha delights in the amenities a club affords, abandoning her parents and her once-beloved Blueberry.

I haven’t decided what indignity Blueberry has to suffer in order to signal Bertha’s perfidy, but something nasty separates girl and cat.  Borrowing heavily from every teen film ever made and with a tip of the hat to the Disney bathos factory, I could put Bertha in a painful scene in which her new-found friends reveal their mocking contempt for her small town wardrobe and values, leaving her weeping bitterly and longing for the comfort of true friendship.  Racing back to her apartment, Bertha intends to set things right with Blueberry, but Blueberry, anticipating Bertha’s distress, has set out to find her at the country club.  It’s not much in the way of irony, but the third act needs some suspense.  Yadda yadda, reunion, reconciliation, tears and promises, a wiser and better Bertha turns the tables, makes a fortune, and rewards Blueberry by building a country club for her and for cats of all every size, shape, and color.  Happy ending, sniff, sniff.

I am aware that this may not be a story worth the telling; it could be seen as more than familiar and not all that instructive.  There are bigger concerns in a complicated world, concerns, for example, about the essential and innate characteristics of cats.  Let’s just leave Bertha out of it.

I am fond of animals in general including cats, but I avoid Cat Whisperers, My Cat From Hell, and Meowmania.  I choose not to search for blogs such as “Des Hommes et des Chatons”, “Dressing Your Cat”, “Popular Songs Performed by Cats”, and “Rowdy Kittens At Play”.  Have I visited “The Infinite Cat Project”, in which cats watch each other?  I have not, although the chain of cats has now passed two hundred and fifty, which is an impressive number of cats watching cats.

Questions are bound to arise when I introduce “Des Hommes et des Chatons” (Of Men and Kittens), a site which pairs cats with hunky men who most resemble them.  I don’t want to get into any aspect of that enterprise, even as I recognize the hours of research its authors must invest in order to keep the pairs well matched.  Keep your questions to yourselves, or hop on whatever hunk/guy/kitten chat room you frequent and let them fly.

No, it was the Country Club aspect that got me.  Would I have been as puzzled by a Country Club for Dogs?  I think not.

In the first place, dogs would be inclined to join a club; a pack is essentially a club without a golf course.  Cats don’t travel in packs; they are independent and … well, let’s leave it at independent.  Yes, Lions hunt in prides, but they are the only felines that do, and they aren’t hanging out together as pals.  Take away the advantages of bagging zebras and hartebeasts as a pride, and lions go their separate ways.

Then, dogs are pretty much always associated with sport.  Big lumpy dogs gambol through meadows and marshes not just to put something alive, or recently alive, in their mouths but because they find snorkling along fun; it amuses them. Smaller dogs harry, or chase things up trees, or stuff their snouts in burrows.  Dogs fetch and catch frisbees; toss the ball and you have a friend for life.  Try tossing a ball for a cat and see what you get.  Dogs compete in a variety of athletic contests, enjoying the challenge and rising to the competition.  And what do they hope for as their reward?   A pat on the head or the toss of another frisbee.

Dogs and sport make sense.

Cats do not compete.  They hunt and disembowel things; they leave heads and body parts on the doorstep.  Silent stalking and lashing tails bring the pounce of the carnivore, but the hunt is hardly sport; cats don’t wander home after a day of not killing something content with the thrill of the hunt.

Cat.  Mouse.  No contest.  Where’s the sport in that?

The closest a cat comes to sport is in toying with prey, allowing them just enough room to start an escape, only to find they are playthings in the paws of a sadistic predator.  There may be a club for that sort of diversion, but that’s a story for another day.

I have to be content with the mystery that clouded the Bertha and cat outrage; I’m certain the real story is far richer than any I might imagine, so I walk away, grateful for a world that continues to offer surprise and wonder.

 

 

 

Going To The Dogs

Going To The Dogs

Jinx, our eldest dog, is at my elbow, panting as she has for several months.  She’s fourteen and her breathing is labored.  She has trouble now getting up the few steps into the house and sleeps soundly in the morning as the younger dogs bound into the day.  She has the run of the house, gets extra meals, and is generally cherished round the clock.  She may fool us all and live for years, or, as we fear, may not respond as we try to rouse her one morning.

The next generations of dogs, son, Satch, daughter Rogue, and grandson, Banner, all border collies, seem in no hurry to change the routines established over time.  They are happy to romp on their own, but when Jinx is in the mix, they still line-up by age, responding to the games Jinx initiates.  Jinx may be a matriarch in decline, but she remains playful and eager to herd us, nudging us when we slow to a walk.  Satch, a blue merle with the face of a panda, is generally sedentary and always hungry.  He is transformed when Jinx begins to bounce in place, nipping at her tail, frequently trotting away in triumph with a spume of white fur at the corner of his mouth.  Rogue, fox faced and busy, accomplishes two tasks at once, joining the pack’s pursuit of Jinx while carrying a frisbee, should an empty moment present itself.  Banner, gawky adolescent, misses cues, invades personal canine space, bounds away barking, distracted by a goose flying overhead.

I met my wife and her dog simultaneously; she met my son at the same time.  We knew from the start that our life together would include kids and dogs.  Fortunately, her dog, a large Shepard mix with exceedingly discriminating taste in humans, came to love us, and we loved him with the giddy love that dog-deprived dog lovers feel when they meet a perfect dog.  I held that dog in my arms as he died, and told my wife it would take some time before I could love a dog so completely again.  The heart wants what the heart wants, however, and soon she came home with a rescue that needed to be loved and cared for.

I contributed my own questionable judgment when visiting friends with German Shepherd puppies bred from a line of schutzhund champions.  One of the pups followed me, falling asleep on my feet as we talked about the litter.  I was sunk, and, having misplaced confidence in my ability to read German, thought a schutzhund, meant “obedience dog”,  exactly right for my wife’s work with therapy dogs and with dog obedience; it turns out that a schutzhund is actually a canine rocket, the sort of dog used by police canine units or in the military.  Our rocket turned out to be a sweetheart with floppy bat ears.  We named him Fledermaus, Maus for short, and loved him too.

Our first true therapy dog , later our first agility dog, a tri-colored Australian Shepherd, came to us from a breeder in Wisconsin, an adventure in cross country conversation that involved papers faxxed back and forth so that when the puppy arrived, my wife named him Fax.  He was irresistibly affectionate, and I joined our children in slipping him treats, probably undoing all the training my wife had begun.  He achieved some local fame when, sensing the opportunities available at a reception for a visiting poet, was discovered on a table top, his muzzle a tell-tale lemon bar yellow.  He was soon joined by Blitz, a speedy border collie we thought a prospective agility champion.  Instead, gentle Blitz turned out to be a champion therapy dog; the picture of him extended to his full length on a hospital bed, nuzzling a child fighting cancer, is still prominently placed on the clinic’s wall.

About twenty years into our marriage, about the time we went from two dogs to three, about the time that I came to expect that every article of clothing I owned would be caked with dog fur, about the time that our youngest dog ate the laundry room wall, I wondered if we had lost some balance in our life as a family.

At that time, it happened that I had an obligation away from home, so packed and headed for the airport, being sure to scruffle all three beasts before leaving the house.  As I waited to check in for my flight, I noticed a passenger travelling with a wire-haired terrier and had to walk over to see if the owner would mind a short visit with her dog.  Walking through the streets of an unfamiliar city, I again found myself approaching every dog that crossed my path.  Before two days away from home had passed, I realized that just as I loved my wife, loved my children, I loved having dogs within easy reach, essentially at that point, the more, the merrier.

So, now we live with four, which is great, but a Facebook friend has been posting pictures of her Australian Shepherd puppy, and it has been years since we had an Australian Shepherd, and they are fluffy with a tiny bobbed tail that vibrates with joy when greeting its owners, and not all that large, and easy to train, and ….