Leader of the Pack

She ain’t no Toto
She ain’t no Lassie

But she does have a high degree of self-importance. Combine that strong personality with a great sense of humor, a little arrogance, limitless energy, and an assertive nature and you have Tessa, a pup that’s very hard to train. When she’s outdoors she generally ignores the simple commands that she aces in the kitchen, Instructions like sit, stay, come, and down–mandatory in the house–are seemingly irrelevant to her in the out-of-doors, irrelevant unless there’s a reward in it. If she’s willing to play the training game at all, she performs in a perfunctory manner. Tell her to “sit,” and her butt barely hits the ground before she’s up, waggling around, expecting a treat.

I need her to come to me when I call and stand still while I hook up a leash. Leash? Leashes are fine if she’s in the foyer waiting to go out. Then the leash presages a walk. But when outdoors on a romp she sees no need to submit and be leashed. She dances just out of reach and demands to be walked home untethered.

“You are not the boss of me,” she says and then takes off across the field, chasing a murder of crows away so she can roll in whatever it is that interests them. And I’m left there, holding the leash.