Rules of Engagement

I’m not a big fan of “authorities” telling me what dogs think.  You’ll read in the pages of some book:  It’s all the same to your dog if you’ve been gone for 15 minutes or 15 hours.  Please.  Did a dog once tell the author this?

Which is not to say I don’t find myself constantly wondering what my dog, and his buddies, are thinking.  Especially when they’re fighting.  Or play-fighting.  When Kemba and Ruckus, my grand-dog, spend time together, they wrestle pretty much 24-7.  If one of them finally winds down and tries to retreat to his

corner for a brief time-out, the other just sticks his nose right back in and eggs him on . . . and off they go again.

Ruckus is a shelter dog.  My son and daughter-in-law did the ancestry search thing, but you really don’t need to see a whole lot of DNA results to recognize that, by and large, he’s a Pit bull.  So what am I supposed to think when I see this tableau:  My duck dog pinned to the ground with Ruckus’s vise-like jaws clamped around his throat, both of them with their eyes rolled back in apparent

frenzy, snarling ferociously?  Actually, very little.  Because I watch them do this all the time.  Clearly, they love it.  Clearly, they love each other.  They’ll interrupt every no-holds-barred wrestling match, every frenetic tug-of-war, every bout of full-contact roughhousing, for a kiss break.  With tongue.

What I do find myself wondering about are the rules — and how all dogs seem to know them.  When are you allowed to bite?  And how hard?  When can you growl?  How loud?  What about tackling?  What can you do with your paws?  How long can you just sit on the other

dog’s tennis ball in keep-away?

I wonder . . . but I don’t meddle.  After years and years and years of raising three sons, my wife and I finally learned:  If they’re having fun on their own, don’t try to “improve” their game.  More likely you’ll ruin it.

Whatever the rules are, dogs know them.  And when some sort of “foul” is committed, they know that, too:  the low growling and grunting turns into a sudden yelp or a sharp, high-pitched bark.  Notice has been served:  Play nice.

I don’t have to know what “play nice” means.  As long as they do.

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