DOG has been a central figure in creation myths of many cultures - sometimes as man's ancestor, sometimes as his creator. According to at least one Native American myth man was created as a companion for Dog. The dog's central place in human society is universally recognized. And rightly so. Our oldest friend, hardest working comrade, most loyal partner - the dog is practically our alter ego. We'd hardly be human without him.
Who knows what inspired that first wild dog to approach our prehistoric ancestors some 25,000 years ago - hunger, curiosity, the need for companionship? In Man Meets Dog, Konrad Lorenz proposes a scenario of primitive man and wild jackals cautiously negotiating a mutually beneficial alliance. Humans may have encouraged a pack of jackals bargaining their superior tracking and hunting skills for a place at the table.
Whoever made the first proposal, the "marriage" of our two species was probably one of the best ideas our prehistoric ancestors ever had. Over the centuries our bond has not only endured, it's deepened. Dogs keep us in touch with ourselves and with nature. We seem to have been made for each other.
After all these centuries, though, it's clear who got the better deal from that fateful alliance. Maybe the best part of our bargain was dog's companionship. The mere presence of a dog has therapeutic value; the phenomenon is so widely recognized and accepted in health care fields it's got a name - "the calming canine effect."
Psychosocial and physical therapists often find canine counselors to be more effective than their human colleagues. Ann Burrick, executive director of Therapy Dogs Inc., has heard of people who haven't spoken for months "who suddenly start talking when they are visited by a dog." One elderly woman hadn't uttered a word to anyone since the day she was transferred into a nursing home. After months many staff members assumed she had lost her capacity for speech as she sat along in her room. That is, until a therapy dog stopped by for a visit. As the dog pushed his head under her hand, the woman began to stroke him and suddenly began to talk about the dog she remembered from her childhood.
Alan Bloom, founder of Helping Hounds, reported in a Tufts University School of Veterinary medicine newsletter that one Alzheimer's patient had been too combative for her caretakers to handle. But when he placed a Helping Hound near her, she spent 15 minutes calmly brushing him, and remained placid for 5 or 6 hours after the visit.
But most of us just appreciate the everyday moments of friendship dogs bring to our lives. In our relationships in society and at work, we can rarely just be ourselves or speak our minds without reservations. But our dogs can show us what is like to live flat out, always in the moment. In Unleashed: Poems by Writers' Dogs, editors Amy Hempel and Jim Shepard have caught some literary hounds in the act of being canine in the rhymes of Birch:
and in country dog, Molly's, soulful howl:
As author and dog lover Michael Rosen writes, human-canine companionship is the one lasting "frequently equitable" relationship people "have managed to accomplish . . . in the five hundred millennia we've traipsed around worrying the rest of creation . . . . Dog people are folk who want their lives to be a little doggier - more physical contact, consistency, innocence, wildness, routine, unselfconsciousness, and even humility. Observing a dog is an exercise in appreciating the gifts of the nonhuman."
One friendship in 500 millennia may not be much of a record, but what a friendship it's been!
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