Three Female Wire Fox Terriers looking for deer!
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Originally uploaded by srittenh.

I had a great time at the seminar. I could have done with some warmer weather, though. It was wonderful meeting Jill, Robin and both Libby’s.

I have always been a spiritual person and to me, the seminar was very similar to other spiritual retreats/seminars that I have taken through church. I go to Unity Church (not Unitarian), and it could be described as “new age”, except that Unity is not new and I really dislike the term “new age”. I’ve also always been an “animal person” and animals are usually drawn to me since I was very little. When I was 2 or 3 my dad had a cranky cocker spaniel that loved me. I used to give them all heart attacks when I’d go over to the dog while it was eating. She never bothered me. The family still laughs at how I used to give directions – “go down the street until you get to the house with the black dog…” When I was a teen, I read the J Allen Boone book, Kinship with all life, which is about animal communication, so this has been bouncing around in my brain for years. I was thrilled when Robin said that she was hosting the seminar; I got to learn more about animal communication and meet some online friends.

Originally, I was going to go alone with Dot. Mom then decided that she’d go and help drive. Mere was going to stay home with Jim and take care of Dash. A week or so before we were supposed to go, Mere decided that she wanted to go too. Mere is a Mommy’s girl and doesn’t like to be away from me at night. But Mere was worried about Dash. So we made arrangements to put Dash at Doggie Daycare while we were gone. On Friday morning, Mere was so upset about leaving Dash, and Dash lookesd so sad as we were getting the suitcases out, Mom offered to take care of Dash while Dot and I were in the seminar. So Dash came too.

I was expecting Dot to travel well, but did not know how Dash would travel. It turned out that Dot is not a good “long haul” traveler, but Dash is. Dot was on hyper alert (while sitting on my lap) and was rather agitated for the whole 6 hours and wouldn’t pee/poop while on a leash. Dash didn’t like to pee/poop on a leash, but she adapted. Dot didn’t. Dash settled down by either Mere or me and slept most of the way. For the last hour, Dash crawled up on Mere’s lap to sleep while she made up love songs for Dash. My favorite was when she proclaimed her love for Dash by singing “I love you as much as I love Mommy and cheese”. That’s a lot of love. At least I rate as high as cheese.

We met Jill and Libby in the parking lot (on a potty break) as soon as we got to the hotel. Neither of our dogs (or libby) peed or pooped. Though Dash peed on Jills carpet at the hotel. Both of our dogs settled down and slept pretty good at the hotel. A couple of bouts of barking when someone (maybe Libby and Jill?) walked by our room.

Mom and Mere drove with us to Robin’s to drop me off. Mere was excited and wanted to “see all those dogs”. We took Dash in to, so that Robin could meet Dash, who both peed and pooped on Robin’s floor. Then Mere did something that was totally unexpected. She insisted that Dash stay with me and Dot. I was very surprised and said ok. It turned out to be a good thing. Dash had a great time. I think the change of pace, new environment, new dogs, new people to visit was good for their mental health.

During our morning session, Mary, our fearless leader, did some meditation exercises and some “warm-up” communication/telepathy exercises. I did surprisingly well. The dogs were wandering around and/or sleeping near their owners during this time. All of them were very calm and well behaved. I was amazed at how they all got along. Robin’s Libby was an extremely good hostess and allowed Dot to stake out the prime territory in the front window. I’m not sure Dot would have done the same if we’d have been at our house.

After a wonderful lunch, we started working with the dogs. Mary chose 4 dogs and we were asked to talk to the dogs and ask them questions like what’s your favorite toy, treat, etc. Dash was one of the dogs chosen and she told the others that she really likes people and her favorite game is chase and her favorite treat is “butter”. Dash is a very social dog who lives to chase and her favorite treat is peanutbutter. Some of what I was getting from the other dogs (that turned out to be accurate) is that Ruby ( http://tinyurl.com/24amao ), the adorable norwich terrier that Mere fell in love with, has an orange squeaky toy that she carries around all the time, and that JD ( http://tinyurl.com/2cgzvp ), a shy border collie, is afraid to leave home because he doesn’t want to be left at a kennel. I later found out that JD had been to a kennel and had run away from it. I didn’t ask Libby Longtail anything because I felt like I new enough about her and Jill that it wouldn’t be a fair test.

Another exercise was that we paired off to “give a reading” to your partners dog. I was paired with JD and his mom, Jacque. I went first. Jacque wanted to know why JD was so shy and protective of her. JD does not like to leave home and barred her teeth in the direction of any dog who came anywhere close to Jacque. So I gave it a try. What I came up with was that JD is quite happy to be with Jacque and doesn’t want to lose her and she will do whatever it takes to keep things that way. Mary came over and basically verified what I said. I was amazed. It turns out that JD is a former rescue and Jacque is JD’s 3rd home, but I didn’t know that until later. Then it was Jacque’s turn to talk to Dot. I wanted to know about why Dot attacks and compulsively licks the back door. I think that Jacque was was feeling very self conscious and didn’t come up with anything for Dot. Mary came over and talked to Dot and told me that when Dot was a puppy, she got her foot caught under the door and she was MAD at that door. I asked Mary to ask Dot what we could do to get her over it and Mary laughed and said that Dot was very stubborn and wasn’t about to give up being MAD at that door. I don’t remember Dot getting her foot hurt by the door, but it is a very real possibility that something happened. And I do know that we have tried everything to get her to quit attacking the door and nothing works. Also, it’s the only door Dot attacks. I was also told that Dot wants new/more squeaky toys of her own (that Dash can’t have).

I certainly believe that humans can communicate with animals psychically, and I feel that I am, perhaps, tuned in more than some. It feels somewhat like cheating or that you are making it up. Perhaps some of what I was getting was from observation, but communication is all about making a connection using all of your powers of intuition, perception and observation. All in all, I was very glad that I went and I think that my relationship with the dogs will be better because of it.

It was amazing that we had four female WFT’s in the same house and only one scuffle. Mom said that it was amusing to watch all of us move so quickly to grab our dogs. Mary said that it’s not unusual for the dogs to pick up on the calming energy at the seminar. I think that there was something to that, because even when all the dogs were excited (and barking) at the deer outside, none of them went for the others. There even seemed to be some carryover effect on the dogs the next day. Dot was much calmer in the car on the ride home.