I had an odd, yet very detailed and clear, dream a few nights ago. It was about my dog Dune, and it stayed with me long after I shook the sleep from my brain.
In it, Dune and I were hiking with a faceless friend alongside a country road. As often happens in dreams, the setting wasn’t any particular place that I know of, though it did have the rolling, golden, oak-studded hills that I’ve come to know as the northern California landscape.
Dune was trotting along ahead of us slowpoke humans when suddenly he raised his nose to the sky and veered into the road, which alarmed me, both because it’s dangerous and because it was so out of character for him. I called to him to come back to me, but it was no use. He was fully enchanted by an invisible scent riding the warm air current and didn’t seem to hear me at all.
My companion and I had no choice but to run after Dune, trying to keep him in view, but he was galloping along far ahead of us, darting in and out of view as he traversed the fenced field across the road.
Eventually we crested a big hill that looked down into a clearing. Way in the distance I could see that Dune had stopped. He was holding stock still, standing about 50 feet from an elephant and her calf – they were what he’d been scenting with such intensity.
I was petrified! I didn’t even really have time to wonder about the sight of an elephant in a California field. My only focus was to get Dune away from there as quickly as possible. I called him. Nothing. Called again, no response. Then I remembered the recall whistle in my pocket and blew it – and Dune immediately turned away from the displaced pachyderm and started to run right back to me, past another, more common animal in the field, a big, black bull.
I was a bit worried about the bull chasing him, so I eagerly called Dune to the nearest gate where I could get him out of the field easily. The bull closed the distance between them, as I encouraged Dune to quickly come through the gate. He made it! I slammed the gate shut in the nick of time, grabbed my beefy lug of a dog in a bear hug, and collapsed on the ground, extremely relieved. Then I woke up.
Right away I realized what the dream meant for me. I have a lot on my mind these days, dog-wise. Dune is aging and another of my personal pack is facing some serious health problems. I am acutely aware of the temporary nature of my deeply intense relationships with my dogs. I believe this realization is the elephant in the room – that life with dogs is ultimately too short and rife with loss.
The dream was also about revisiting Dune’s history and past capabilities. His once magnificent body is fading. His musculature is withered and he can no longer hear well nor run fast – hence him going into the road and ignoring my verbal requests for him to come. Yet the dream reminded me so clearly of how elegantly and efficiently he once moved and of his lovely trail manners when in real life we have had surprise encounters with large bulls, cows, and calves.
My dream also was a tip of the hat to Dune’s newly installed whistle recall. Fortunately, he can still hear the high pitch of a whistle and will respond. It’s essential to have some sort of off-leash control with a hearing-impaired dog; otherwise it is not safe to let them run off leash in public. I will use the whistle for as long as he can hear it, so he can continue to enjoy off-leash time. (To be clear, though, in waking life I would never walk any of my dogs off-lead along a road.) This incredible dream of mine also commemorates a dog’s scenting abilities. Old dogs in particular dial in deeply to their olfactory systems as their other senses begin to fade.
I believe my powerful dream was a celebration of one extraordinary dog’s life – and it was both terrifying and beautiful.
Kelly Gorman Dunbar is Director of the Center for Applied Animal Behavior, where she recruits and trains the instructors for the Dunbar family business, SIRIUS® Puppy & Dog Training. She is the creator of the SIRIUS Sniffers scent-detection program. Kelly is also Founder and President of Open Paw and consults on various matters.
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