A CONVERSATION BETWEEN FRIENDS
by Don Donaldson
These are our two Westies. That’s Freddy on the left and Billy on the right. They’re both ten. 
We’ve had Freddy for nine years and Billy for only six. For the first four years of Billy’s life, he belonged to a dog breeder. When the breeder didn’t want him any more the guy just took him to an animal shelter. When Billy first came to us, he didn’t even know how to walk on a leash or have the strength to jump from the porch into the house. In fact, he didn’t seem to know anything about how to be a house pet… probably because he’d been locked up in a cage for most of his life. But as soon as he met Freddy, he became a dog prodigy, learning so fast it was amazing. It was apparent that he was learning it all from Freddy. But how? I never saw them having any kind of dog conversation. I’ve often wondered how this transfer of information took place. Here’s a conversation I can imagine them having:
FREDDY: “Hi kid. Where you from?”
BILLY: “I don’t really know. Not from anywhere close, because we were in the car a long time when they picked me up to bring me here.”
FREDDY: “You should be aware of a few things… First of all, do not pee or do the other thing anywhere in the house. Nothing will get you in bigger trouble than that. I did it once and well, I don’t even want to think about it.”
BILLY: “Did they hit you?”
FREDDY: “They’d never hit us or hurt us in any other way. But the shouting… you don’t want to hear that. If you’d like to go outside, just find them and stare at them. They’ll figure it out.”
BILLY: “What if I’m hungry?”
FREDDY: “The stare works for that, too. They’ll lead you into the kitchen to see if you want to go out. The food bowls are in there. Just start licking the empty bowl. That usually works.
“Once you settle in, you’ll want to sit in their lap and get your belly scratched. The smaller one with the soft hands does it the best, but the other one, is pretty good, too. “
BILLY: “How do I get them to pick me up?”
FREDDY: “The absolute best way is too sit up with your paws in the air side by side and start pumping them up and down, like you’re running in the air. They cannot resist that one.”
BILLY: “I saw a big basket of toys in that other room. Are those all yours?”
FREDDY: “They were… but you can play with them too.”
BILLY: “Thanks. I thought you might be… upset to have me around.”
“FREDDY: “Humans are great, but they have almost no sense of smell and can hardly hear anything. I just don’t get that. So… you can help me protect the place, you know… bark like crazy when anything seems odd.
BILLY: “I can definitely do that. What’s the best part of living here?”
FREDDY: “The best part…? No question… it’s the love.
A final note from the humans about the toys: After about a year, the two dogs seemed to reach an agreement that all of the toys now belonged to Billy. We didn’t hear that conversation either.”
Don is a retired professor of Anatomy and Neurobiology. His entire academic career was spent at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center, where he published dozens of papers on wound healing and taught microscopic anatomy to over 5,000 medical and dental students. He is also the author of seven published forensic mysteries and five medical thrillers. He lives in Memphis, Tennessee with his wife and two West Highland terriers. In the spring of most years he simply cannot stop buying new flowers and other plants for the couple’s backyard garden.
