Charles –

He is a Border Collie, that makes him a bit strange right out of the gate.  They like to be busy.  Worse, he grew up in a Condo, with a cat.  Needless to say, he was on meds, anti depressants to be exact.  Charlie is what I call him, but his mother calls him Charles a lot of the time.  Charles is only one of many, many animals this family has seen.  Border Collies need a job, it has just occurred to me that his new job may actually be us.

That dog has given us structure on our day, forced us to have exercise, makes us commune with nature, drags us to the beach, pushes and pushes, so we have to go get ice cream, that dog has been a life saver.

He has a cave he hides in, under the stairs, gets a new bed every 6 months or so, has yogurt in the morning, gets burgers with ketchup and loves to play hide and seek.  He gets brushed every few days, gets his nails done every other week, we have a real prince here.

When he really will not listen or becomes too much of a prince, he loses his cave.  Cave privileges are big in our family.  Once upon a time we had “Cellar Dweller” teen.  I probably shouldn’t compare kids to dogs..  I have a cave or barn or 2 barns and an office… Like I said everyone needs a cave.

He knows the time of day, his time basis is food, walks, nap time, dog biscuits and the dark.  He isn’t like the dogs of old, who went out, hunted, checked the barns, the other animals etc.. Charlie will get up, go out the door, sit on the deck and wait for you.  If it is dark, he won’t even get off his bed until you are out the door and plead with him.  You have to explain that regular dogs go outside whether it is dark or not.  Prince Charles sometimes will act like a dog, he will chase things, but instead of squirrels, he chases or plays with more sedate items,  golf balls, he loves to play basketball and he uses the exercise ball any chance he gets. Recently, he did go after a rabbit, but lost him quick.

His latest thing is thievery.  It turns out he likes to steal Apples from Chip.  His whole ruse starts as a “walk”  … ha, he disappears, goes to a certain tree, grabs his quarry and makes a beeline straight back over the wall to our house and puts it in his stash.  After watching him a few times, I decided to check this tree out.  Once again, Charlie was onto something, these were great Apples.  Some ancient variety likely planted by a farmer over 100 yrs. ago.   I too have become a bit of a thief.

I told Chip this story, he was amused and he had a 30 year old story about fruit pilfering on the property himself.  The land was always in his family, but for awhile a local farmer used the property for pasture and a little hay.  But years before that, Chips grandfather had all sorts of fruit trees and berries etc.. one of the crops he grew was peaches.  The peaches can sometimes be fickle, but they grew great up there on the hill.  Chips mother had noticed the peaches were almost ready, she had told Chip to get ready to pick as need be.  Mother couldn’t believe it when the peaches kept disappearing, she thought deer or rodents or Chip wasn’t doing his job.  Then one day, Chip looked out the window and the old farmer was there, harvesting all the ripest Peaches from the tree.  He would leave his house, hike up the hill check on the cows and take all the peaches.  Chip devised a plan, he was now out harvesting before the farmer would arrive – Mother was happy and  case solved !

I was out for a walk yesterday, with my sister, “how ridiculous” she said, that the dog dictated so much, she was a good sport and came along.  As we were finishing the walk and I pointed out Charlie, stealing another Apple, she laughed and then she noted “he really is good for you, you both love this little routine”   Amen sister, amen.