My Dog

I recently noticed a skill my dog has that I am extremely envious of. And no, I’m not referring to places she can lick, or her ability to eat things straight out of the cat box.

What I envy is her ability to completely trust somebody.

I’m forced to assume, simply because I’ve not seen any evidence to the contrary, that there is no “maybe” for dogs. For them it’s either yes or no, black or white, wrong or right. There’s nothing in the middle.

I believe that, because of this dichotomy of emotions, she is able to completely trust someone. At least until that someone does something to change that and then she will be completely unable to trust this someone.

It’s all or nothing.

In our house we have tile in the hallway. Maddie, my dog, likes to lie there because it’s cool. If I’m walking down the hallway, I can step with my foot landing two or three centimeters (about ½ inch for you non-metric folks) away from her nose and she doesn’t even flinch. I believe that until I bop her in the nose once or twice, which I don’t plan to do, she will continue to trust me not to hit her, and therefore simply lay there without moving.

Maybe it’s the result of caution, maybe it’s result of fear, maybe it’s result of having an older brother…I don’t know. What I do know is that I could never have that kind of trust in a person. Not even a really good friend.

I think it would be wonderful to be able to trust that way, but alas, if I’m lying on the floor and somebody is walking in my direction…I’m getting out of his way.

Yep, for me life is all about NOT having someone’s shoe that close to my face.

Ever!