I’ll be the first to tell you that I’m not keen on sappy doggy videos on the Youtube. I hate pulling up ridiculous picture collage set to an Evanescence song. Gee, look, a dog in a pool, here is one sleeping on a couch with his legs sticking up, now one looking pissed-off because it’s got a birthday party hat on it’s head— oh the memories! Every teenage girls first video project is about their pet, or Justin Bieber, or their pet named Justin Bieber. All the while, some weepy singer is crooning away in the background like the senior class just graduated. It’s some repugnant stuff, I tell ya, but times were getting tough around the Hayhurst house and I needed some help.
No, I did not look up the frick’n Dog Whisperer. The guy reminds me to much of some of the scumbag players I’ve done time with in the bush leagues, and most of the people on those shows of his are spineless, baggage laden know-nothings that need a hug from a guy with an accent and perfect teeth. Look at the cover of his instructional materials and then look up the cover of Joel Osteen’s books—there is an uncanny resemblance. I’m not interested in Caesar’s Way, thank you, I’m interested in Dirk’s Way, and Dirk’s Way, currently, is carrying his dog around the house like a mule until he figures out a solution.
Yah, Ok, I admit, the carrying thing is getting old. Furthermore, my wife weighs nearly as much as my dog does. She can’t cart Xylo around. I had to get him unafraid of the steps, which meant I had to get him to focus on something that made him not think about the fact the he was on steps. Usually, the food thing works. The owner is his dealer, and as time goes by the dog will do whatever the owner wants in order to get a hit of whats in the Costco bag. But Xylo was so afraid when on the steps that I couldn’t feed him. The desire for food did not over power the fear of the steps, and it didn’t matter if it was steak, lobster, or fresh cat poop.
I was going to fix this problem, which, ironically, started with me carrying Xylo downstairs so I could use my office. His body, as soon as it goes over the hard wood perimeter of the kitchen, tenses up. The closer he gets to the stairs, the more rigid his body gets. Like some magnet operating under reverse polarities, he bends away from whatever direction the stairs are in. Gently, like any caring, sports pedigreed father, I ‘whisper’ to him, “oh for Christ’s sake stop being such a big baby.”
I set him down on his lower-level bed. He’s got like three of them in the house, which I’m a little perturbed about since he gets carried to his beds x 3. I got one bed and no body carries me to it. Damn dog, you’d better kill an armed robber, or save a kid from dying in a well, what with the service tab you’re racking up.
Like all greyhounds, the dog falls a sleep on impact with soft, fleecey things. He snores while I start searching around YouTube for help.
Mostly it’s the same stuff. People talking about their dog like it’s some voting member of the United Nations, like an ambassador is living in the house and not a rescue that sounds like a clogged up vacuum cleaner when it licks it’s genitals. “You need to know the needs and wants of your dog from his prime-evil days as a pack animal. Make sure you establish the fact that you are it’s dominant alpha and that is not up to debate. You’re the master of this relationship, you define the parameters by which love is given, and he is to love you.” Woa, easy their lady, Bella and Edward get married in the end, it’s all going to be okay. I just want the dog to go up the damn steps.
In my hunt, I land on videos of dogs barking and roo-ing at each other. The noise wakes Xylo up instantly. He starts pacing the place anxiously, trying to find the sound. He runs laps around the basement, sniffing, searching, whining. A light goes off in my head.
Minutes later I’m up the steps with the laptop on max volume, blaring the sound of greyhounds getting their roo on. Xylo is going bananas. I call him up the steps. He starts then stops. I jump up and down like an idiot with joy. I keep calling him, “come on buddy, you can do this!” I got get the secret weapon—the leash. He knows it means WALK, OUTSIDE, TREES, SQUIRRELS. The combined forcea of the leash and the possibilities of other dogs having a party with me are too great for Xylo to resist. He comes all the way up the steps, on his own. One day later he goes up and down unassisted.
I was wrong about you overly saturated internet dog market, you serve a real purpose after all.