From the porch

I won’t make this long. But, the weather’s cool enough to make clear the passing of time, and I felt compelled to write.

We’ve been in Nashville just over 2 months, and I’m still not certain my brain has quit hopping around. There’s a cocktail of emotions swishing around—between uncertainly and unrelenting bliss. This image, me sitting on a porch next to a sleeping Cattledog in middle Tennessee, feels impossible. It also feels inevitable.

I’m having a hard time pressing past the stresses that growing up in America brings. The endless guilt your meant to feel when you make a wrong turn; when your afternoons are filled with leisure. Spending nearly all of my twenties hand-washing dishes has made loading a dishwasher an act of guilt. A place to wash my clothes without a sack of quarters? Am I worthy of this?

Maybe it’s the Catholic upbringing, years of hustling around as an actor, or just plain genetics, but I’ve been built with this anticipating that to have good things means you have good things to lose. The terror in relaxing into a salary, a skill, a relationship, even.

I mean this to say, I think I really like what I’m building towards, and the only moments of uncertainty or happiness that bounce into my brain stem from the fear of waking up.

How do you do tricks?

Here’s how to get your pup her first trick title

The tl;dr

  1. Register your dog as an AKC dog (mixed rescues welcome!)

  2. Pick out 10 tricks from this list

  3. Teach those tricks to your pupper

  4. Film those tricks anyway you’d like

  5. Find a trainer who is AKC certified to review the video - you’ll need your AKC title, the trick checklist, and the video verification form (which is now apart of the checklist).

  6. Send all the signed documents to trickdog@akc.org

The detailed version

  1. Register your dog as an AKC dog (mixed rescues welcome!)
    The cost is around $35, though you do get a free vet visit with an AKC vet, which would offset the cost. Keep the pup’s ID handy for next steps.

  2. Pick out 10 tricks from this list
    Beyond basic skills, I found agility the best way in to a lot of tricks on this list. The ask is extremely clear, compared with getting into a box or other abstract ideas for young dogs.

  3. Teach those tricks to your pupper

    Having a very scared, energetic dog, I had no choice but to teach her some tricks to calm her mind and give her confidence. The Puppr app remains a great source of inspiration, as well as the Tesla The Mini Aussie Instagram account. I would never expect to spend more than 10 minutes a day on these tricks. I’ve learned any longer than that, Birdie is extremely frustrated (almost as much as me)

  4. Film those tricks anyway you’d like
    Here’s the video I made. There are no requirements, but I think the key element is to show Dog and owner together, and not just the dog putting on a show. It’s about the working relationship, in the end.

  5. Find a trainer who is AKC certified to review the video - you’ll need your AKC title, the trick checklist, and the video verification form (which is now apart of the checklist).
    I reached out to this woman Sheyla, and she was super fast and kind. Her information on this process is also very informatative.

  6. Send all the signed documents to trickdog@akc.org
    You can do everything online, thankfully, and input your credit card instead of mailing in a check (which…. does seem to be what they’d prefer. Classic).

Many people view dog tricks as secondary to training a well-behaved pooch, but after a year of (more-or-less) dedicated trick training, I see how fundamental it is to developing a dog. We force these animals to puzzle their way into our sedentary lifestyle. Their sharp nose, their boundless energy, their wolf-like prints in the sand go wasted in apartments all over the cities of the world.

I used to hate it—wishing Birdie would just become a breathing build-a-bear. Yes, her drive to move, seek, and learn frustrates me on a Friday night. But, with trick training, allowing our bond to grow, allowing me to seek a deeper purpose in the day (the way she does), has been… an unexpected joy to dog ownership.

When a dog comes to you when she’s called… I’m not sure there’s anything more satisfying than that.