The Dogs of Spring

There was a day this week that was bright and shiny.

The sun was out, the ice was melting, and my dog Drago and I had no choice — if we mean to be present at all for the good things in our life — but to take to the streets for a walk. At every turn, we heard the gurgle of water chasing the path of least resistance toward the sea. Neighbors too were outside, working their way through forgotten chores long buried beneath snow. A collective sigh of remembrance was palpable as we recalled the warmth of bygone springs, and looked forward to the expansive hours of outdoor splendor that lie ahead.

We took deep, full breaths.

We skipped along, searching in earnest for the tiny tips of exuberant daffodils. But the next day, I had to don my layers again and brace myself for the shock of cold air as Drago and I handled our morning chores. The chickens in my yard were disappointed as well, having enjoyed two full days of luxuriating in the sun and rolling in the dirt. On this day there was no dirt — only crunchy, cracking, iced-over mud again.

It must be spring. A time of transitions. A time that is between other times. It reminds me of the liminal place that dogs occupy in our stories.

In ancient Greece, Hecate — goddess of magic, crossroads, and the in-between — was perpetually accompanied by dogs. She roamed at night where three roads met, those liminal points where the Greeks believed the membrane between worlds grew thin enough to slip through. Her hounds were said to be heard before she was seen, their howling rising at boundaries that human senses could not perceive. Offerings of food were left at crossroads to appease her — and always, her dogs were there too, eating from the edges, belonging neither to the domestic world of the hearth nor the wild world beyond the city walls. For the ancient Greeks, if dogs barked into the darkness, it was possible that Hecate and her hounds were passing through.

She is not alone in this. Cerberus stood guard at the gates of the Greek underworld, ensuring the dead stayed dead and the living stayed living. Anubis, the jackal-headed Egyptian god, escorted souls through the Duat — the shadowy passage between life and afterlife. Across the ocean, the Aztec xoloitzcuintli guided the deceased through the underworld so they would not have to make the crossing alone. Something in the dog made culture after culture reach for the same image, independently, across oceans and centuries.

We modern folk may not identify completely with these stories. But dogs don’t just lie between planes of existence. They guard all of our thresholds, and facilitate crossing them. This is obvious when they lie at our feet, keeping watch over our emotions (and detecting early signs of illness), and when they bark at the door to keep strangers at bay. But they do it in subtler ways too. They act like bridges between worlds.

I know a lovely man who was in a deep depression, too ill in his mind and heart to leave the house—until he adopted a puppy. His love for that puppy brought him outside, three times a day and more to train the dog and give her the outings she needed. His dog saved his life, really. When we let them in, our dogs get us up and out. We humans need that.

Dogs’ role as social lubricant has also been studied*. “Social lubrication” is a somewhat gross way of saying that dogs make it easier to make and continue friendships. This is the reason it’s so easy to talk to folks about their dogs when we go out for walks. It can also ease tensions between people who know each other well. Once, in my youth, when I had gotten into a fair amount of trouble for my behaviors, the stress inside my family home was as thick as butter. We could hardly look at each other. So, for days all we talked about was the dog. Wasn’t he cute doing this, and wasn’t it funny that he did that? He helped us ease back into conversation together.

And then, and perhaps this is the most under-appreciated of all of their bridging qualities, dogs help to reconnect our civilized selves to our wilder selves. It is amusing when they beg for food, because we have been trained not to show this side of our animal nature. It is inappropriate for me to slobber on the glass at the cookie counter, but when my dog does it, I am free to laugh at such urges. My dog also literally reminds me to smell the air, feel all types of weather, and stay vigilant to the world around me. There is wildness in that.

Sometimes we could all use a good roll in the mud. Or, perhaps we should just take our shoes off for a moment and let the world in.






*Social lubrication links, for starters, if you’re into science: One. Two.