Well, this was a walk down memory lane. The good and the bad. lol.
Our dog growing up was a Lab/Chessie cross. My parents got him when I was four, and put him down partway thru my first year of university, 1 month shy of his 15th birthday.
From puppyhood they did things like take his food away while he was eating, etc, to make sure he wouldn’t snap at any of us kids if we were dumb enough to do it.
My youngest brother was born when Theseus was 2. It’s unlikely he would have survived childhood without that dog. :lol::lol::yes:
Where we were, the dog was. I rode him like a horse. (not even kidding!!!) He had his ears and tail pulled by young kids with shameful regularity, and tolerated it stoicly. He tolerated ALL children. He babysat my youngest brother, which was good, since said brother had a tendancy to go “POOF” the instant my parents turned their back for an eighth of a second.
My mom came home from work one day and there were vehicles parked on the road a HALF MILE from home. Brother was about 3 and had wandered off the instant my dad’s back was turned. My cousin was trying to pick him up and take him home, but no way no how was the dog letting him put the kid in the truck.
When cousins would stop to drop mail off, they couldn’t even get on the deck if we weren’t home. Eventually as he aged he’d let them on the deck, but not actually in the house. Mail in the BBQ was common. :lol:
He was an awesome jehova witness deterrent, especially after he followed them snarling to the garden, where they followed my mom in high heels (she was tilling it up at the time), and when she cited being too busy to stop, they asked if she’d restrain the dog. “You made it here, you’ll probably make it back to your car.” They did…Theseus growling all the way. And they didn’t come back for a LONG time. Like, years.
He never outright attempted to bite anyone. Well, except the one time he bit my one cousin (adult), but we all felt the guy had it coming.
He wasn’t socialized to other dogs as a youngster, and never did tolerate other dogs coming onto “his farm”. The farm was HIS, and when a cousin’s dog came wandering over, he chased him home. When my uncle’s dog showed up from across the field, he had him cornered under the deck. He was absolutely a one-dog home.
And he killed cats. We never did manage to keep cats alive/around while we had him.
But he was the best dog our family could have asked for. Never chewed shoes, or anything that wasn’t his. He did steal and chew firewood…you had to pick pieces of firewood up around the yard before mowing. We even watched him, more than once, trot off with a log to go “hide” his prize somewhere in the bush.
He could chew pop cans to smithereens without ever cutting his mouth. God knows how, but he could. And it didn’t matter how well they were stored away out of reach, he found them.
He didn’t have toys, because he always assumed anything we touched was “ours” and would not touch them. I can’t remember if he retrieved/played fetch or not. This is probably pretty atypical.
He was, without any real work/obedience training, the perfect dog. I’m not sure how/why, but we obviously really lucked out.
Because of all this, I would consider a chessie someday as a family/outdoor/farm dog… although preferably crossed with a lab. But it would have to be the RIGHT one - there would be a LOT of research involved to the exact specific dog chosen.
Darnit, he was just a fabulous dog.
Oh, and he HATED baths. He didn’t get them often - but he most certainly did whenever he engaged in his FAVORITE passtime…swimming in sewage :dead:
I just remembered atime when he was still fairly young, and my uncle brought his malamute over. They got along famously…and of course he had to show the Mal exactly WHERE the best swimming hole EVER is. Both despised their baths, that day.
The love of sewage has been passed down, by the way. My border collie girl discovered, all by herself, the fabulous thing called the “Grey water pool” when we go home to visit. :dead: Lots of baths in her future!
He was loyal to a fault, 100% hooked on all of his family, and absolutely trustworthy…not to mention the best babysitter EVER. Fond memories…
D*MN he was a good dog.
