The Lessons Our Pets Teach Us

As the years have passed, I’ve become aware that each of my pets has come to me to teach a particular lesson that I needed to learn. In our focus on obedience, agility, tracking, or flyball, it’s easy to fall into thinking that we have  superior intelligence, but our pets’ innate intelligence may surpass ours in some ways.

Some examples from my menagerie would have to start with Copper, a Chesapeake Bay Retriever, who came into my life at one year old and stayed until 11. Copper would have given Marly a good run for his money. Copper’s first drama was to chase a tennis ball into a vat of iodine at the shelter and end up on IVs for a week. Then he was chosen for drug-sniffing school but flunked out. At the first hint of boredom he ran away from home, even if it meant climbing a tree to get over the fence. Once he lived with a homeless man for half a year before coming home. This is just a tiny sample of his mischief. Suffice it to say, Copper’s sense of adventure taught me life can be pretty interesting if you throw caution to the wind once in awhile .

Next was Kutya, a livestock guarding dog called a Kuvasz. These dogs are smarter than most humans, and there’s no question she was smarter than this human.  I raised

her  from a puppy and did just about everything wrong. She was a little hellion until I figured out how to handle her around her 4th birthday. She ended up being my heart dog, that one dog we all encounter who becomes part of our soul. Just when we had it figured out, she developed bone cancer at 7 years old. She taught me many lessons, but the most profound was how to give and received unconditional love. I learned from her that I could be furious with her about some rebellion but know even in that moment that I loved her deeply.

Pewter, the gray cat who showed up at 6 months, was my first experience living with a cat. I was a dog person, so left her care and most of her attention to my husband. She punished my indifference by leaping out from under the tiger lilies and attacking my ankles. The trick did not endear her to me. Her other favorite sport was to turn belly up for unsuspecting

visitors, inviting a tummy rub, then attack the hand that rubbed her. Pancreatic cancer took her at 13. One of the lessons she taught me was that we can grow to love someone  just by going through the motions in the beginning, sort of like an arranged marriage. The other, that I’ve taken to heart quite naturally, is that it’s ok to be feisty, as long as you don’t bite hard. 

And last but not least, the inspiration for this article, Scooty, my angel in fur. She was the first of the senior dogs I adopted, and we enjoyed 4 precious years together. This evening I held her in my arms at home while the vet released her to join the other fur-angels. When she first came to me, her sweet, gentle nature seemed almost too bland, after the challenging and rewarding years with the other critters. Soon I noticed how pleasant it was to have an easy pet for a change. She had a calming effect on me. She didn’t have Copper’s adventuresome flare, or Pewter’s clever trickery, or Kutya’s sense of humor and intelligence. She was just easy going.

 Someone had instilled in her the most refined manners. She would stand at a door ajar all evening but never nudge it open. Unlike most pets who consider the bathroom their proprietary domain for undivided attention, she would not enter the bathroom even when invited. She would not scratch at the door to come in after a potty. If I forgot to let her in, she would patiently sit on the porch and watch the world go by. Scooty taught me one doesn’t have to be dynamic to be special. She taught me to take life easier. It was possibly the most important lesson of all for one who tends to be just a tiny bit intense.

I console myself tonight with the chorus from Alan Jackson’s Sissy’s Song:

She flew up to heaven on the wings of angels
By the clouds and stars past where no one sees
She walks with Jesus and her loved ones waiting
And I know she’s smiling, saying
Don’t worry about me.

That would be my self-less, easy-going girl. Rest in peace Scooty.

If you’ve learned a special lesson from your pets, please share a comment below.

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