Come, Sit, Stay, Lie Down. I had work and it made me happy.
I also had a box of toys. Whenever I felt the mood growing stagnant, I would plunge my face into the open box and pull out a ball or some other object—most of them were rubber because the cloth ones I shredded and ate. The only item I didn’t care for in my toy box was something Grant gave me: “It’s a nylon bone for him to chew; it’s good for his teeth,” Grant advised Burke. He would thrust this odorless, tasteless, hard “nylon bone” at me. “Get the bone! Want the bone?” Grant would shake it and I would pretend interest because I felt sorry for him.
After a time, I didn’t need the wooden box in order to reach the food bowl. “You’re a big dog now, Cooper,” Burke declared. I decided “big dog” was the same as “good dog.”
Or, maybe not, because around the same time my boy started saying “big dog” he began speaking with the obvious intent that I was to do something in response—something harder than Sit or even Stay. “Let’s do some training, Cooper,” Burke announced every day, and I would know it was time for me to pay attention to what was always a bewildering set of spoken commands.
There was a loop of rope on the door of what I learned was a “refrigerator.” Burke shook it. “Open” he said. He kept shaking it until I just had to have it in my mouth. Growling playfully, I backed up, the door swinging on its hinges and wonderful food odors ghosting out on cold currents. Burke gave me a treat! Open meant “tug the rope and get a treat.”
Leave It was very confusing because it started with a treat, this one under a heavy glove on the couch. I recognized that glove from when Grant and Burke would throw a ball to each other in the yard—a game I loved because when one of the boys missed I would leap on it and then it was my ball.
Burke held a chicken treat under the glove and just sat there, even though we both knew where the chicken was! Finally deciding I needed to take the initiative, I went to move the glove away. “Leave It!” he snapped at me. I was utterly baffled. What did that mean? I stared at the glove, drooling, and went for it again. “Leave It! No! Leave It!”
No? What did he think a chicken treat was for? “Leave It!” he commanded again, this time handing me a different treat, a liver-flavored one. I preferred chicken, but with this madness going on I decided liver was the best I was going to be able to do.
After several repetitions of “Leave It!” I decided to wait him out, and he gave me more liver. It made absolutely no sense, but as long as it ended in a treat it was fine with me. I learned to cheat by turning away from the glove as soon as he said “Leave It.” Treat! Then the morsel was under the glove on the floor and Burke was no longer holding it. I calculated I could move the glove and gobble the chicken easily enough, but when he said “Leave It” I almost couldn’t help myself, turning away from the glove automatically.
Treat!
Eventually I decided that whenever my boy said “Leave It” I should ignore whatever had my attention and focus on his hand, which was a much more reliable source of treats.
Those delicious morsels were not the best part, though—it was the affection pouring from Burke as he said, “Good dog, Cooper.” I would do anything for him. Burke loved me and I loved Burke.
Pull was easy—I marched steadily forward with a rope on my harness that looped back to the chair. But Pull had variations that took me many days and many treats to learn.
“Watch this,” Burke said to Grant. “Okay, Cooper, Pull Right!” That meant tug in one direction. “Pull Left!” That meant tug the other way. This was hard work for a dog, but Burke’s praise plus Burke’s chicken made it all worthwhile.
“What’s that for?” Grant asked.
“Like if I am having trouble in the snow. Cooper can pull me.”
“You’re not going to try to go out in the snow. That’s stupid,” Grant replied.
“Not deep snow, but you know, even if it’s shoveled, sometimes it’s tough to get traction.”
“What else have you taught him?”
“Okay, this is the best one.” Grunting, Burke lifted himself out of his chair, sliding onto the couch and then, his arms out, rolling onto the floor. I watched tensely as he crawled with his arms into the middle of the room. “Okay! Cooper? Steady!”
I went immediately to my boy’s side. He reached up and seized my harness with both hands. “Assist!”
He gripped me with one hand and helped push himself with the other as I slowly dragged him across the floor to his chair. “Steady,” Burke commanded again. I held completely still, taking his weight as he scrambled into his seat. “See? Cooper can get me back into the wheelchair.”
“Cool! Do it again!” Grant said.
Though I had just managed to get him into the chair, Burke fell out of it a second time. I did not understand what had changed for him, lately, because it seemed like he could barely manage to stay in the thing now that we had learned Assist.
This time, when Burke called me to him, Grant stepped over to the chair and dragged it into the kitchen, which was all the way across the room.
“Why’d you do that?” Burke demanded.
Grant laughed.
“Come on, Grant. Bring it back.”
“Let’s see if Cooper can figure it out. Like Dad always says, an easy challenge is no challenge at all.”
“So you’re saying this is somehow good for me.”
“Or maybe good for the dog.”
Burke was quiet for a moment. “Okay, Cooper. Assist.”
I did not know what to do. How could I do Assist when the chair wasn’t there?
Burke pulled on my harness until I was facing the kitchen. “Assist, Cooper.”
I took a tentative step forward. “Yes!” Burke praised. “Good dog!”
Did he want me to drag him into the kitchen? This was a different Assist than we’d been doing, feeling more like Pull Left. But I remembered how “Leave It” went from “don’t try to eat what’s under the glove” to “ignore what’s on the floor even if it smells delicious.” Perhaps “training” meant everything in my life would keep changing.
I started moving steadily toward the kitchen. “Yes! See? He figured it out!”
Grant waited in the kitchen with his arms folded. Burke was panting a little by the time we got there. “Good dog, Cooper!”
Treat!
Grant picked up Burke’s chair. “How about this?” He carried the chair into the living room and up the stairs. “Can he get you up here?” Grant called down with a taunting laugh.
Burke just lay on the floor. He seemed sad. I nudged him with my nose, not understanding.
“Okay, Cooper,” he whispered finally. Something like anger was pushing the sad out of him. “Let’s do it.”
{ FIVE }
Burke seized my harness and steered me around so that I was facing the living room. I thought I knew what was coming: when he said “Assist,” I headed toward the couch, figuring that’s where he wanted to go. Then he surprised me, twisting me again. “Assist!”
The stairs? I dragged him that far and stopped, bewildered. Grant was grinning from up at the top. Burke put one hand on the first step and his other hand gripped my harness.