Our JL arrived home the other day bent slightly out of shape. On asking her why, she responded with…”Where has the common gone in common sense, can you tell me? Everything is so confusing. The answer is not the answer, what I say is not what you hear, what I mean is not what you think I mean. How are we supposed to effectively work within society when the rules are not the rules! I am glad I am a Math Major. Math is pure.”
That observation started us down this path of “common sense” exploration. Upon listening carefully to the clients we deal with every day, and reflecting on what they told us, we quickly came to understand that JL was absolutely right! Good old fashioned common sense was…uncommon in this day of high tech, instant everything and many subtle meanings that we attach to our word,s furthermore assuming that others get exactly what we mean the way we mean it every time we speak. If they do not get it, we find them slow, lacking or worse (thought but not said) stupid!
This led us to ask the next logical question. “How do our dogs interpret the busy inconsistencies in our human world”? How do our dogs interpret what we say and how we say it.
We give our dogs credit for understanding our every nuance and implied meaning to our words from day one! We give them the human traits of loving us unconditionally, thoughts of complex reason and automatic understanding of our world. Is this a sensible way to think of our dogs abilities? Even with children we must put in vast amounts of time and energy in teaching them the “rules of societies road” Why then do we so naivety assume that our dogs once brought into our homes will automatically learn the “ropes”?
Think about it! How does a dog learn? It follows the lead of the older group member that it respects. To begin with that would be its mother. It then goes on to learn that there are others and that they must be respected for their position. Next they observe and learn that there is one that all the others respect and they follow the lead and respect that one too. They are now aware of the hierarchy or class structure of their pack.
With this knowledge comes the understanding of their position in the pack and they understand by virtue of this knowledge what the expectations of them are. They understand the rules, boundaries and limitations in which they are expected to operate.
This is the point at which human and canine part ways. We cherish the development of individuality in ourselves and our children. We humans encourage individual thinking and tell our children that they can be anything they want if they work hard at it and apply themselves. We rebel against people who have authority over our lives. We rebel against class distinction and have fought wars over subjugation.