..in 10 weeks, 5 days. That would be the day I broke my
foot. My doctor said I could start out slow...which I took to
mean, "go ahead & walk your normal 5 mile hike the first day
out!". Good thing I didn't listen to my own interpertation (which
was completely wrong, by the way...she clarified a few minutes later
with "a short walk around your neighborhood or urban trail...10 minutes
at a time"). Good thing I started out slow. What I should
have done was left Maggie at home.
Let me back up a bit. We got our dog Maggie 3 years ago...now
that I think about it, it might be 4 years ago. She
came from Second Chance Center for Animals,
where she had been given a reprieve from the death penalty at her
former shelter. I think she was around 10 months old. And
she was a sad, sad looking dog. She was so terrified of people
that she slinked around the walls of the shelter on her belly &
wouldn't make eye contact with you. And me, lover of all pathetic
animals, actually thought she was too pathetic to take home (you'll have
to ask Don about my pathetic animal addiction...ask him about Liza...so
to say she was almost too pathetic is saying something).
Anyway, we had brought Mia (our Westie) to introduce her to
whatever new dog we were bringing home & they put you in this
garage with your potential choices & your dog so you
can see how they interact. (Mia has a tendancy towards making
dogs want to eat her...it's sad, but true). So
here's Maggie, so terrified to be there she's peeing herself &
this other dog who peed on Mia's head...we were torn between who to
adopt & the shelter people told us to give Maggie a chance...so we
did. And she's a freak.
I say she's a freak in the most loving of ways. Apparantly, in
her 10 months of life, she's spent 4 months in a shelter & 6
months suffering unberable torture. We don't know exactly what
happened to her, but when we brought her home & she finally sucummed
to being petted, I found a thick piece of twine stitched & knotted
in her side. So in my book, she was tortured. And because of
her rough beginning, if you yell at her, talk to her sternly or look at
her, she freaks out & completely shuts down. She hides.
She won't look at you. Makes it really hard to train her.
So the whole point of telling you this is that because of Maggies
unknown background, she's a freak on a leash. A complete &
utter freak. I usually walk her using her easy walker harness
http://blog%20download_files/cm_003.html
which frankly, is the best thing on this planet! Without it she
tries to rip my arm out with her pulling. Well, today, I
forgot it. See, we had to get Kendall to school & the dogs
over to grandma daycare (Don's working odd hours this week & the
dogs bark too much). We were late as usual & I decided at the
last minute to take my first walk with them at Buffalo Park. Oh,
the lessons we've forgotten....never, ever walk Maggie without her
harness again. Never. I think my arms might just be longer
today for all the pulling she did. And what's worse, when she
pulls & sees people, she pulls & looks over her shoulder.
Which one of these days is going to cause me to break something.
(She had nothing to do with me breaking my foot...that was sheer
stupidity.)
So. We walked one mile. In the gale force winds.
The little dogs (for some reason that's how we refer to them now) were
excellent. And Maggie, well, grrrrr......but it felt good to be
outside. It felt good to walk again. And Maggie & I will
get our groove back. I mean, come on, I've walked her almost
every single day since she came to live with use & for 10 weeks
& 5 days she got maybe 5 walks (don't even get me started on that...grrr...). We'll get it back. I'm certain.
And just because they're so cute & they were so dang good today, here are Mia & Ori, our little dogs:
I shaved them naked a few weeks ago. And I didn't do such a great job, which makes them all the cuter.
