Blame Game

I’m not sure where to begin other than to say: “It’s not my fault!” Being an only canine means that I take the brunt of the blame when things go wrong. I chase a cat or squirrel that trespasses in my yard and it’s my fault if they happen to end up dead. If I find a mouse that the cat assassinated and try to resuscitate it, I’m suddenly to blame for the mouse’s demise. My people try to be fair, but frankly I think that canine profiling is so ingrained that people just have a hard time accepting that the dog is not always to blame! Take last Friday for example.

My people got up early on their day off (actually I woke them up because they would sleep the morning away if I didn’t!) and decided to go to the beach for a day trip. I love the beach there’s nothing like it: canines to play with; seagulls to chase and yummy fish smells. I was extremely excited! On top of that, they decided to go to my favorite beach in Ogunquit, Maine. It’s a bit of a drive, but for the wide open, hard packed walkers beach it’s worth the extra miles. It never fails however, that my people need to stop along the way. They insist on drinking coffee before we go and like clockwork they need to stop at the first rest area we come across. I whined that they should keep going but they didn’t listen. Instead they assumed I was whining because I needed to go too – (I wish they’d learn to speak K9!) I didn’t need to of course, but that didn’t stop them from dragging me out of the warm car to the ‘pet potty walk’ area of the rest stop.

Now I don’t know what the people facilities look like, but Maine does have nice pine tree dog areas. Massachusetts I should point out has horrible canine facilities and should be ashamed! But Maine, well they understand canine needs. A female canine appreciates being surrounded by the fresh, clean pine scent and the males all need that tall pine vertical, because, as we all know, it’s all about how high you can mark the spot when you’re a male. Anyway, I decided that since I was out of the car, I’d relieve myself and say hello to a greyhound I saw when we first pulled in. I was walking my person over to the greyhound when it happened.

Now, I want to repeat it’s not my fault – I would have stayed in the car. I would have been happy to keep driving. And for the record, I was not pulling on the leash – that is, no harder than I normally do, probably less. One minute I’m walking towards the greyhound, the next I see two legs fly into the air and my person tumbling on the ground. I was excited about going to the beach too, but you didn’t see me tumbling like a circus performer at the rest stop! I was so embarrassed and humiliated! I couldn’t believe my person would do that when I was about to make friends with a new canine! I just wanted to crawl back into the car and hide my face. I wouldn’t even look at my person flopped on the ground (that’s the last thing you want to do is to draw attention to and encourage bad, inappropriate behavior!) I made like I hadn’t seen my person lying on the ground (because you know people have to be dramatic about these things!), and just waited until they had gotten up, at which time I calmly walked them back to the car.

We made it to the beach even took a walk. My personal photographer person took some shots of me (my other person, if given a camera, takes photos of everything else BUT me!) and then we went to lunch at Bob’s Clam Hut. It wasn’t until we got home that my circus tumbling person started complaining about a potential injury. Now, first of all, my people are not that young so they really shouldn’t be doing the acrobatics to begin with. Second, I have to wonder about a person who goes tumbling through a rest area and doesn’t realize until hours later that maybe that wasn’t a smart thing to do! Needless to say, when we arrived home they decided that perhaps a trip to the human vet was in order. I insisted on being fed before they left, since having already been embarrassed by The Tumbler, I didn’t see why I needed to be inconvenienced about when I ate! It was a good thing too, since they were gone for hours.

The outcome?

Yes you saw that correctly: an ankle brace (and don’t forget the crutches) for the sprained ankle incurred by my less than athletic person. I know that it will be assumed that because I had the misfortune of being at the other end of the leash when my person went airborne, that I will be blamed for causing the injury. I want to stop any rumors now: I am not to blame! I’m sure if my person is honest and avoids the convenient ‘blame the canine’ scenario, you will hear about the tree root that my person failed to lift 2 feet over (thank goodness people only have two feet or we’d be picking people up all over the place!). But given the embarrassment factor on this injury, I’m betting it’s Blame Daisy Day at work tomorrow! Such injustice canines have to endure!

• Posted in: Treeing walker coonhounds
• Tagged: coonhounds, dogs, Maine, New England, pets, shelter dogs, Treeing walker coonhounds