Helper Hounds: Brisket Helps Miryam Deal with Online Learning
Well said Luke That sounds familiar Luke smiled and clucked his tongue I reached up to kiss him Do you remember how Brisket used to be Luke asked When I first rescued him Not really Zahra said I was little then Well we had to work a lot on how to focus Luke said Brisket was a wild wild terrier Just like Kale Salad Here let me show you something to help Luke slid his computer monitor back He called me up on the desk and stood up so Zahra could get a better look My tail slid like a rudder across the desk Two pens and a notebook fell to the floor with a tap and a thunk Careful with that tail Zahra laughed But my eyes were no longer on the screen My eyes were on the liver treat in his hands Luke brought it to his eyes and said Focus in 4
his chirpy dog voice My eyes locked on his My tail stood stick straight I didn’t move an inch Luke flipped me the liver treat Good boy Brisket Luke said See how easy that is I bet you could teach this to Kale Salad Just grab a treat bring it to your nose and say Focus When Kale Salad makes eye contact give him the treat and praise like crazy You can train Rufus to do the same
Luke smiled Zahra giggled Rufus McGuiken better never look me in the eyes she said I’d give him a treat all right Luke laughed out loud and sat me back on his lap He scratched my head while I thought about Rufus I thought Rufus was tops But Zahra and Rufus never got along They fought over me mostly Over who could walk me to be precise Most days Zahra would knock on the door and offer to take me for a walk while Luke worked Most days Luke said yes tossed Zahra my leash and off we’d go As soon as we left Rufus would bound out of his door and insist that he come with us This drove Zahra crazy Zahra was nine months older than Rufus And those nine months gave Zahra the right to be trusted to take a wild Brisket like me 6
to the park and make sure I ran through my obedience drills Since Rufus was way younger his job was to make sure I got all my zoomies in and wiggles out If you ask me the two of them made the perfect combination for an afternoon at the park Even if they both bickered a lot Zahra Luke said I’m sorry But we’ll have to video-chat another time Just got an alert that we’ve got a new case Luke scratched my wiry fur and asked if I was ready for a new job I barked YES I better let you go straightaway then Zahra said Anyway Mom just got home Dad has tea ready and Mom will want to know how my homework is coming along Luke smiled Hope we haven’t kept you from it Not at all I learned something new I’ll tell Rufus about it after tea Goodbye Brisket 7
