This is the first time that I’ve ever done this: Repeat a photo from one day to the next, but I think that it bears repeating. Today, I received a nice e-mail and I’d like to quote just a small line from it:
I can’t remember when I’ve seen a photo that captures the essence of a great human/dog relationship so perfectly.
I spent a good 15 minutes watching this man and dog work together. For anyone who loves dogs, you could tell that it was a great relationship. The dog was supremely confident, eager to do his job, and seemed to be totally enamored with his friend. Notice, I didn’t say ‘master’, I said ‘friend’. They certainly had the bond of friendship going. It was a very easy-going relationship. Here, in the picture, a single finger, touched lightly, on top of the dog’s head was all the reminder needed to wait for the whistle.
At the time that I took it, I thought not much of it other than it being a great moment. I didn’t really think of what it might mean to someone else, but I’m certainly glad that it did have meaning, even more than it had for me.
I would suppose that when we are out shooting, we recognize something that is special to us, capture it, and then when we share it with the world, we sometimes get pleased to find that it is special to someone else, too.
I have a dog, Hobbs, who is my good friend. I miss him quite a bit and we are always happy to see each other on the weekend. It brings a smile to my face just to think of him. One of his behaviors that I enjoy the most is gratitude. When I take him for a long walk, I like to take him to the area that is not quite finished and let him run freely. He loves. Every once in a while, he’ll come back to me with what seems like a smile, jump up, give me a lick, then take off on a new destination. I simply hug him and tell him that he is very welcome. I think that it’s way of thanking me for the opportunity to run.
BTW, today is Hobb’s birthday! He’s 9 years old and, according to the chart in the vet’s office, that is about 45 – 54 human years for a dog his size. Smaller dogs age a bit slower than the larger breeds.
And it’s Halloween! I’ll have to give him a special treat when I get home.
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5 Responses to “Special Relationships”
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Happy Birthday Hobbs!
Happy Birthday to Hobbs (I love that name!!!)
I absolutely love that photo. It is so touching.
I haven’t had a dog in quite a few years. My kids aren’t all that fond of dogs…not sure why. They just never wanted one.
Both Mark and I grew up with dogs and we had one early in our marriage. Unfortunately we had to get rid of her. She bit me and had become nasty. With small children in the house I wasn’t taking chances. We found a wonderful older couple who was willing to take her in despite her recent history which they were fully aware of.
I’m not sure why she got nasty but it happened when I was pregnant with my second child. We got her when my oldest was a toddler and she was so wonderful with him. He loved her too. She was a wonderful friendly Lab, really well behaved, and she trained so very easily with really little effort at all. She was 10 weeks when we got her and house trained in a week. In short she seemed the prefect dog. We didn’t crate her either except when traveling in the van. There was never any reason to crate her. The first time I put her on a leash she behaved as though she had been fully leash trained. She did every command without any fuss from day one. The only bad habit she had was digging. She dug caverns, not holes, huge ditches! We used to joke how we could hire her out to a landscaper for planting trees. She uprooted quite a few in her day. She loved to be outside too.
So you can imagine our surprise when she turned on me. She was 3 years old at the time. I had noticed that she had started getting a little skittish in the months prior and wasn’t sure what to make of it. She had been hit by a car the summer before, not hurt at all according to the vet which was amazing to us. She was not one to run into the street and for whatever reason one day out of the blue she got out and ran into the street. She had never done it before and never did it again. She was also possibly shot at by some moron kids with a BB gun when she was in the yard. We found BB shot in our pool in the summer. So we had several theories about what happened that affected her but never anything concrete. It was quite a heartbreak for us.
She did have a very happy life with her new owners which made me think it was the kids in the neighborhood that freaked her out because of the bb shot. I will never be sure though.
NOT a dog-lover by any means but a photo to tug the heart strings!
Take a tad off the left and you’ve gotr an image to rule the world!
This photo certainly got to me. My husband and I haven’t had a dog in a while now—the last heartbreaking loss left us quite wounded. Now, we are ready to get another dog, but can’t do it until we get an area fenced. I grew up with dogs and have had dogs most of life. They are very special creatures capable of such devotion and affection. I get emotional just thinking about the dogs I had the longest—dogs who were such a vital part of my everyday life—each of them for more than a decade. Now I am missing that companionship more all the time. This photo really brought that feeling home.
Laurie’s story is heart-breaking. At least there was a happy ending for the dog. The question as to what happened to that poor animal must be a frequent and painful mystery.
Happy birthday to Hobbs. Now I will think of you on weekends reuniting with Hobbs. I’m sure he misses you and the long walks together.
I’ve grown painfully in love with the tom cat we brought into the house a couple of months ago. I say painfully because he’s already old, I know that, and when he does go out for the warmer parts of the day, I ache in my heart worried about him until he comes home again. Pets really do bring much to our lives, and that’s something I’d forgotten over the years of not having one.