September 1993
I don’t even know how to describe Tyler to you. He’s my eyes my love and an extension of my left arm! He’s so intelligent! What I forget he remembers – and on occasion the other way around. He takes me around cars parked in driveways trees growing in the middle of sidewalks he rarely misses a curb and he gets me around stray dogs friendly neighborhood squirrels and baby strollers. Granted he does tend to pull a bit hard still but we’re working on that – oh and yes squirrels really do tempt the living daylights out of him.
And he’s so gorgeous. He’s kind of a medium gold with a touch of strawberry blonde. His belly hair is long and soft and baby fine and forever needs brushed as does his ample hind quarters skirt and billowy tail but the first thing you notice about him are those expressive brown eyes. All he has to do is roll them once in your direction and he has you hooked. Sometimes when we’re walking in harness he’ll look back over his shoulder at me just as if he’s checking to make sure everything’s okay.
What else – oh – his feet! This is one large dog – with feet the size of my fist! When I’m loving him up and playing with him he sometimes puts his front feet in my lap and gives me this big slurpy lick. Standing on me like this the size of his feet become clearly obvious! Sometimes when we’re out working he zigs and I zag and I clip his little old toes. I always make a point of immediately apologizing but he doesn’t hold it against me. He’s still got his side right up to my leg never once trying to move away as I’ve heard some dogs do. At any rate when I’m brushing him I always take a minute to rub each foot and remind him that eventually our zig and zag will mesh and there’ll be less toe accidents.
Ears. Being a working dog Tyler has a sturdy outer coat and a good insulating under coat. Well brushed and groomed his coat is soft and shiny but his ears are like pure velvet. And he certainly likes to have them rubbed. One of his favorite things is laying his head on my leg and just thoroughly enjoying an ear scratch. One cute thing I’ve noticed is that generally Tyler’s coat has a slight wave to it but right under his ears the fur is REAL blonde and
looks like a new perm!
All of this and we’ve only been together a week tomorrow! They say it takes 7-10 days for the bonding to happen. Well we’re nearly there because one of the other students made an observation today that when Tyler is sitting at my side he’s watching me and she said it looks like he’s grinning!
I could never thank Tyler’s trainer Rich enough for all the TLC he gave to produce such an exceptional dog. I didn’t pick Tyler and he didn’t pick me but it must have been God that directed Rich to make the perfect match. The neat part is we’ve only just begun!!
Forever in my heart --
| Tyler |
| Bonnie |