My Wabi-Sabi Master is My DogWritten by Galina Pembroke
My Wabi-Sabi Master is My Dog Perfection is a gooey chew toy on a worn out old blankie By GALINA PEMBROKE Up until recently, three dominant attitudes have ruled my living space: my boyfriend's: if it breaks, fix it. my own: if it breaks, replace it. and my dog's: if it breaks, keep it and love it all more Without realizing it, my dog has been a master practitioner of wabi-sabi, a Japanese aesthetic philosophy that celebrates simple and handmade, including flaws. Especially flaws… More than just appreciation of unpretentious art and craft, wabi-sabi is a uniquely joyful way of viewing and contemplating world. As Leonard Koren describes it in Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets and Philosophers, wabi-sabi is "the beauty of things imperfect, impermanent and incomplete." It is no coincidence that first practitioners of wabi-sabi were Zen Buddhist monks and tea-masters. My dog Tucker is a 30-pound, wooly sheltie-crossbreed; painted by creator with a wholly imperfect, abstract pattern of brown, black and white. With his flattened, rock-chewing teeth; he is an unlikely leader. Yet, through his actions, Tucker has shown me beauty of wabi-sabi . Presents and Presence Every year I celebrate Tucker's birthday which I maintain is day he stepped out of dog pound and in through my door. For me, this means renewed challenge of shopping for a new dog toy that promises to delight Tucker and light up his wabi-sabi life. For Tucker, this means aggravation of me dangling another squeak-toy or Kong product in front of his unimpressed snout. I am such a consumer fool. Every year it's same. Polite dog that he is, Tucker examines shiny new object with feigned interest before dismissing it. He then curls up in his war-torn blanket to gnaw on his ancient, barely identifiable, mangled ball. Once a perfect sphere, it now resembles a cracked egg. With its aged crevices and broken, rounded protuberances, I am unable to understand how he could be near it- let alone mouth it. Tucker, however, couldn't be happier. Drooling contentedly over his gooey-soft ball, he shows me that perfection cannot be bought, achieved, manipulated, or maintained. It is an inner experience: canine wabi-sabi. The Perfect Cloud In India, there is a mantra signifying this feeling of fullness. Translated, it is "That is perfect. This is perfect. From perfect springs perfect. If perfect is taken from perfect, perfect remains." Too bad this understanding is absent from so much of our "new is better" consumer society. Wabi-sabi is a less wasteful way of living. Even Tucker’s assortment of bought-and-soon- forgotten dog toys can be donated. Satisfaction with things as they are, though used and worn, means we replace less and save more. Handmade and one-of-a-kind, wabi-sabi pottery is deliberately and gloriously "pre-owned" right out of box. Wabi-sabi regards these flaws as enhancements. Western culture imitates this in marketing, with new-worn jeans and marked-up furniture. We tag this as recycled and call ourselves retro. Recycling doesn’t exist in wabi-sabi world. My attempts at converting Tucker’s ball into sheet-plastic via recycle box, have been met with prompt retrieval by digging paws and slobbering jaw. In wabi-sabi, decay replaces conversion. [Would be interesting to note similarity(?) to modern Western countercultural aesthetic of worn and torn blue jeans and recycled vintage clothing and furniture.] As Buddhist poet and musician Leonard Cohen observes in his song "Anthem," "There's a crack in everything; that's how light gets in." In life, rain and ice may crack and erode new and beautiful, but crumbling marks they leave behind are signature of water, ultimate life-giver. Thus, wabi-sabi doesn't simply see silver lining in every cloud, it sees cloud itself as a silver lining in a perfect blue sky.
| | How To Housebreak Your Dog...Even If It's Still A Puppy.Written by Jake Berlin
The one unpleasant aspect of owning any puppy is job of housebreaking. As cute as puppies are, each must be trained but remember that every puppy will conquer housebreaking although at a different rate. While some dog breeds can be housebroken in a very short amount of time, other breeds can be quite challenging. Paper Training Paper training or using commercially made training pads should be avoided. While this method of training has long been promoted as being easy and successful, truth is that it teaches puppy that going potty indoors is acceptable. Instead of encouraging puppy to go outside, it actually causes confusion. Therefore, you should consider paper training as a last resort. Crate Training Using a crate to potty train your new puppy is an excellent and very effective method. With crate training, your puppy will, in time learn to wait to do its business outdoors. It is important to remember that puppies, just like babies, have very small bladders. For this reason, getting your puppy to wait through night without needing to go outside will take a few months. This is normal and requires patience, love, and support on your part. With crate training, right type of behavior is encouraged in your new puppy. Schedule Regardless of breed, with dedication and a lot of patience, your puppy will learn rules. Keep in mind that age does play a role in how easy your dog will complete process. Since a small puppy eats more meals than an adult dog does, you can expect more trips outside. For this reason, you will need to set up a schedule that coordinates with puppy’s age.Typically, a small puppy will need to go outside about every two to three hours. Although you will need to establish your own schedule, following is what you might expect during potty training period. 7:00 a.m. – Take puppy outside immediately after waking up 7:15 a.m. – Feed and water puppy inside a crate large enough for puppy to move around 7:45 a.m. – Take puppy outside to go potty 11:45 a.m. – Take puppy outside to go potty 12:00 p.m. – Feed and water puppy inside its crate 12:45 p.m. – Take puppy outside to go potty Around this time, your puppy will be tired and in need of a nap. Gently place your puppy inside crate. To make it feel more comfortable and secure, add in an old sweatshirt of cozy blanket, a couple of soft toys, and then allow puppy to rest for about an hour. Chances are that you will not need to coax it much since puppies sleep often. Remember, this schedule is to encourage a pattern, making potty training easier. 2:30 p.m. – Take puppy outside to go potty 4:30 p.m. – Take puppy outside to go potty 5:00 p.m. – Feed and water puppy inside crate 5:30 p.m. – Take puppy outside to go potty About an hour after your puppy has had dinner, take it for a short walk and then spend quality time playing and enjoying it. This quality time will help build bond and a relationship of trust, which only helps to strengthen desire of puppy to please its master. In addition, playtime is excellent for socializing puppy while helping it sleep longer during night. 7:30 p.m. – Remove puppy’s water and any food for night 8:30 p.m. – Take puppy outside to go potty 9:30 p.m. – Put puppy in crate to sleep More than likely, your new puppy will not be able to go all night without taking care of business. Listen for any restlessness or whining, a sure sign that puppy needs to go outside. While process can be inconvenient and tiresome since you never know what time puppy will awaken, with consistency, your puppy will learn much quicker. Remember, if puppy should have an accident in its crate, never administer punishment – it was just an accident. Most puppies that mess in their cage feel embarrassed and ashamed. If your puppy has an accident, take it outside anyway so association is reinforced. Then, clean crate, add fresh bedding, and again, tuck little one in for night. Word Association During potty training process, your puppy will begin to give you some kind of signal that it needs to go outside to potty. Your job is to learn those signals and sooner better. You may notice your puppy walking in circles, walking toward door, sitting and staring at you, pawing at you, sniffing ground, and so on.
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