Duke at Home
Hello! It’s Duke again. My friends at the Blue Mountain Humane Society tell me they rarely hear how a former guest of the shelter is getting along in his forever home. They’ve asked me to write a “where is he now?” type of article about my new life.
Well, the Executive Summary is that I’ve adopted an excellent human!
I now spend most of my time with my human (more on him below) and with a discrete set of others whom I’ve come to know. At the shelter, by contrast, I might on a given day rub elbows with any of 30-some employees, dozens of volunteers, and 25 or 30 other dogs. Having to constantly read the body languages, expressions, and scents of this ever-changing crowd was pretty stressful, since it required being in a state of High Alert every time I left my kennel. You might tell me to “Chill out, Duke,” but this advice is codswallop. We high-performing dogs have read Napoleon, and we know that “the price of success is eternal vigilance.” Fortunately, my new home requires less vigilance, and therefore generates less stress. I’m now able to do a far better job of focusing on my human.
My human understands that we canines thrive on predictable, consistent patterns. I know our daily domestic routines - when meals will be served, getting outside in the morning, taking my human for walks, and the patterns around bedtime. On a given day I confront far fewer surprises than I did at the shelter. Speaking of bedtime, I now sleep in a crate at night. I was skeptical about the crate at first. But surprisingly, it turned out to be quite soothing (perhaps because my ancestors lived in dens (as some dogs still do, I understand)).
Also, it’s much easier to know what is expected of me here. At the shelter, dealing with so many humans, it was difficult to know what they wanted. Now I’m getting clear guidance in the form of positive rewards, consistently applied when I do something right. Being a smart boy and eager to please, I’ve figured out that my human wants me to improve my impulse control, so I’m doing much less yelling, pulling, and jumping. We’re also working on my manners; I now wait politely at the door until he invites me inside. Honestly, I don’t understand the point of this, but it seems to make him happy.
And finally, I’m finding it far more rewarding to work primarily with one human who understands me, as opposed to a mishmash of well-meaning amateurs. I enjoyed the team at the shelter, for sure. But I was only one dog dealing with a small army. There was no way I could provide the help that all of them required. I do best providing round-the-clock canine services to one small pack of humans in a proper home setting.
I suppose the old platitude is true - life is a journey. I started in imperfect circumstances, found myself training humans at the Blue Mountain Humane Society, graduated to training humans at the Washington State Penitentiary, and finally landed with my Forever Human in Idaho. I am still an active, somewhat goofy boy. But I am becoming calmer, bettered mannered, and am focused on the project of guiding my human through our journey together.
