You know what they say - "a home without a dog is just a house". "They" being dog owners far and wide, of course. One of those owners is Christopher Matthew, who describes a life happily lived with furry beasts. So, are you a dog devotee like Christopher, or happy to leave the fun and fur to other households?
Christopher Matthew
The pleasures of being a dog-owner
Posted on: Thu 06-Nov-14 12:11:46
(46 comments )
Man's best friend...and social wing man.
One of the great pleasures of being a dog owner is the easy way one falls into conversation with other dog owners while out and about. The other day, in London's Hyde Park I met an elderly Irish woman who was out walking with her perky little West Highland Terrier.
His name was Rocco and, being only ten months old, he was exceptionally full of beans - unlike our Kerry Blue Terrier who was decidedly off with him and brushed him aside with the odd growl, rather like a sixth form prefect with a bumptious new boy.
I gathered that the woman was a widow, and that she had decided to buy a dog by way of companionship. Things had obviously worked out well for both of them.
"He is my rock," she said - and no pun was intended.
Had my wife been present, she might well have commented, as she is wont to do, "I can't think how anyone can live without a dog."
It’s a sentiment with which all fellow dog owners would whole-heartedly agree. Kerry Blues have been our dogs of choice for the past 40 years. Indeed, there was one in residence when we first met in the early seventies. She was called Kerrels (the dog, that is) and, as one brought up with dachshunds, it took me a while to establish a working relationship with an animal that was a good deal larger, hairier and more boisterous than anything I had been used to.
When you have experienced the very real feelings that a dog has for its owner, the sheer strength of will that many possess, and the huge range of human characteristics that all breeds display, you can't help thinking that there is a lot more going on in those furry heads than scientists would have us believe.
Kerrels’s attitude to me was no less cool, and for some time her gaze was (to quote P.G.Wodehouse on the subject of a similarly hairy dog in a Blandings novel) "cold, wary and suspicious, like that of a stockbroker who thinks someone is going to play the confidence trick on him."
Happily, we developed a warm relationship and she became a central figure in both our lives. As have all her successors.
A friend once remarked of one of them called Milly, that he thought she was really a human being wearing a dog outfit. I am not one to anthropomorphise animals, but when you have experienced the very real feelings that a dog has for its owner, the sheer strength of will that many possess, and the huge range of human characteristics that all breeds display, you can't help thinking that there is a lot more going on in those furry heads than scientists would have us believe.
Emily Dickinson went further. "Dogs are better than humans," she wrote, "because they know but do not tell."
Mind you, their attention span often leaves a lot to be desired - to wit, this little verse I once wrote on the subject, called Puppy Love:
When Dad comes home at half past six,
I'm on him like a shot
With leaps and bounds and slurps and licks
I give him all I’ve got.
I couldn't love a human more;
That's why I treat him rotten;
Then carry on as heretofore,
Attending to my bottom.
If you're a dog owner, or lover, let us know why you think they're man (and woman)'s best friend below.