I’ve always wondered when dogs bark at each other, if they’re actually talking. Like, if they’re having actual conversations with each other.

“Hey, doofus! Get off my yard, you son of a–!” I imagine the scary ones yell, with or without expletives, depending on how they were raised. My dog Sam is a labrador retriever, good-sized, and as he’s gotten older (he’ll be 12 this coming December), can barely see or hear anymore. When we walk past a particular German Shepherd in the neighborhood, he’ll occasionally tweak his ears a little in response to her angry proclamations, but otherwise ignores her, sometimes without meaning to, since he doesn’t always hear her in the first place. “Yeah, right, OLD MAN! This is MY turf! Ha ha HA!” All spoken to our backs as we walk away unharmed. But maybe she’s not that vicious. I can’t speak her language nonetheless, so how would I know?

Those who think that language across different breeds of dogs is distinct enough to prevent universal canine conversation have no imagination. Why on earth would we have all these different kinds of dogs existing on the same exact plane if they can’t even communicate amongst themselves? And especially when You (looking at God, or Whoever, here) have also forgotten to give them human speech patterns, for our sake and theirs?

The nervous ones must act like many a shy child, hiding behind mommy’s skirt, and if they must speak, revolve everything around their owners. “Well, if my mom says it’s okay to come over, I guess we could run around and chase a tennis ball together for a while…” Or maybe they’re just screaming from anxiety, the small, tiny yippers and yappers and squealers, who react to this mammoth before them, my little senior citizen Sammy, with terrified, shaking bodies. But who knows? Maybe they’re just excited, in their own special way.

I’m surprised that so many who look like their owners don’t act like them. 

Whosoever holds a leash might say hi when they see us on our walk, Sam and I, and calmly stop to talk or just slow down, friendly, while their dogs start doing everything in their power to prevent such a huge standstill in their favorite time of day. “Stop! Interrupting! Walk!”, they must be chanting to the man or woman petting Sam on his calm, impressive, gray-eyed head, oblivious to all sound, or trying valiantly to find the source of the smell and activity around him. “Fiiiiiinally,” they sigh in relief as their wagging tail is led home, far from the blind intruder of this sacred bonding ritual. I feel happy for them.

Those who growl at Sambo (pronounced like Rambo) for no reason: what’s your problem? You guys don’t need to instigate anything with this guy, nothing at all, and yet here you are with your Go ahead, make my days. My dog can’t hear you most of the time, anyway, and what do you think he’s going to do? He can’t find you halfway across the street in time for a stand-off, and never wants to pick a fight, anyway. Move on, fido. Move on.

My Samuel is a saint. 11 years old, and stumbles on curbs he can’t see coming, and  sometimes even on his own four feet. Walks like an angel, unperturbed by all or most disturbance around us. I think he gets bored nowadays, not being able to look out the front window at our street like he used to love to do (to such an extent that he could recognize our and our neighbors’ cars, and would only bark at new, unexpected ones); and he doesn’t play with toys anymore, even when he acts like he wants to, maybe because he doesn’t trust them to stay with him once they get out of his nose’s reach. Sometimes I think he understands everything, so much more than I can, about the inner workings of dogs’ tongues and minds, and the outside world of suburbia, nature, and the earth itself. Other times, I think he just zones out, happy to be alive and well and breathing the sunny air, surrounded by beautiful and strange shapes and colors, hearing my voice and feeling my hand on his shedding golden fur. 

Maybe one day we will be able to talk to dogs, finally indeed. But if we do ever reach that day, I think we’ll mourn for what came before it, for discussion between species through telling facial expressions, simple commands, the sight and smell of food, and the touch of skin to fur. Our relationship with our dogs is usually our least problematic one. Let us cherish it.

    Until next time,

    Bark, bark…bark, woof.