The Toby Chronicles : Learning to go

When Toby first came home, I worried about him. He didn’t eat, he didn’t drink and he didn’t go to the bathroom for almost two days. He turned his nose up at everything, even warm and juicy hot dog bits. Who can resist that!? So, I started to think he was sick or something. He seemed healthy, and I haven’t had the chance to get him into the vet yet, so I thought I’d just wait and be patient.

Sunday morning, at O dark thirty, I picked up Toby thinking today was the day and carried him out to the back yard. I couldn’t find my slip on shoes anywhere and in my half asleep state, thought I’d take a shortcut and only threw on my old, tattered robe and walked out into the yard barefooted.

Toby wanted to play. It’s been nearly 18 years since I last house trained a dog, so I had to read some refresher material. I’m supposed to go out with the dog and be very boring. Playing with the dog only distracts them from the real business at hand. Nope, stand there, look at the cute little ball of excited fur through bleary eyes as he looks up, pleading for me to play. I had to remember all my tough love mantras here… Gotta be boring. No playing allowed. Stick to the business at hand.

Well, it wasn’t raining, but it was very cold outside and I’m standing on frozen grass with a threadbare robe and my skivvies on… There’s all this stuff in the books about being consistent and finishing what you started, but after about 10 minutes of this I was starting to get a little impatient and very cold.

I started to think of innovative ways to get the little ball of fluff to go. I’ve started to use the word. My word is “busy”. I say it when he goes. I know from my experience with Sonny and Sweetie that after a while, pavlov’s syndrome kicks in and even if they don’t have to go, they try the moment they hear that word. And so, I’ve started that. It reminded me of how happy I am that I didn’t pick the word that the lady in that park had chosen. She chose “tinkle” for her dog “Biggles”. I asked her how her husband felt about encouraging “Biggles” to “Tinkle”… Apparently, not so much.

And so, I’m cold, tired, bleary eyed, and impatient. Did I mention that I had to go too? I needed Toby to go so I could go. And then it hit me. I’M THE ALPHA MALE! If I go, Toby will follow suit. And so, right there, in my back yard, I pulled aside my robe and showed Toby how it’s done! Right on the old rotten stump. Before long, we’d both gotten busy and were back in the comfort of home and warm bed.

Toby still doesn’t go on demand. After all, it’s only been a few days. But we now have an understanding. We’ve bonded. We’re brothers from another mother.