Yipping and yapping, selective hearing loss at commands, who are you and what did you do with my puppy? Those are some of the ways we realize there are good days and a helluva lot of bad ones. But just when it is darkest, here comes the dawn.
No matter the pupil, regardless of the skill, there are peaks and valleys and a lot of plateaus. The former is a sweet, sweet experience to savor. Coping with the latter two are critical to maintaining sanity. In recent days the balance has been tipping toward plateaus with a slight chance of valleys, but I get a reminder every so often of the sweet side. And that’s what keeps both of us going.
I was trimming toenails today, the Dremel set to high-pitched whine. Flick stood, stoic. It wasn’t fun but it wasn’t what sounded like waterboarding a few months ago. Retrieves that last month were a rodeo are now orderly and almost like the books say they should be (hah!). Hand signals in the field are acknowledged and often followed … a far cry from the hell-bent-for-election runaways of age five months.
Yep, it’s all about the long view.
Scott Linden Outdoors 
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