Just kidding – kind of!
Rudy has been staying with us while his family travels. He’s 14 now and I’ve known him since about 10 weeks! I haven’t seen him in two years – from puppy to 12 he was pretty much the same dog – it’s hard to see him as an older dog and not as playful anymore. He’s a really great dog and fits in with my dogs well.
Loose leash walking can be such a challenge to train – for those who are struggling with young dogs – please, persist, it’s worth the effort. Blaze and Rudy were both challenging as young dogs in terms of polite walking. But now they just walk along nicely (…other than when Rudy has to take very long pauses to smell/mark!), side by side. This isn’t because they’re old dogs – it’s a result of training!
“why is this puppy trying to share the bed!”
One of my favorite Rudy stories – our group of friends made a movie for a school project in Latin class and we had our dogs act out the scenes. 3 male dogs….in togas. There were quite a few costume changes that day! Rudy was the young-boy character and in one part he had to run back to his house – we used a long line and recalled him across the view of the camera – he tried so hard to run as fast as he could. We then tossed a toy (before filming) into a plastic-kid-play-house and he jumped in through the window to get it with extreme determination! We laughed so much when watching and re-watching that portion.
Old dogs are a different kind of fun than young dogs and puppies. Some of my original group of friends who I did dog-show-things with are still into dog activities (and some of their parents are!) but some have moved onto other things. Of the original group of dogs, Blaze and Rudy are probably the only ones still left. Some of the others have been gone for quite a few years.
As I tell puppy owners – even when puppies are naughty, in 10+ years, you’d love to see the dogs be healthy enough to do some of those horrible, annoying, frustrating behaviors (puppy biting! stealing things!). It’s important to get the puppies off to a good start – it will make the next 15 years enjoyable!