"Get Out of the Gate!!"
Krayton Kerns
12.20.06
When I was nineteen we had a litter of Aussies. I could say they were the product of a carefully planned mating between two proven stock dogs. But, that would be lying. The likely father was a decent ranch dog but the momma was a barn sour bitch that preferred to spend her days digging through the garbage, and rolling in dead things. She was a peach. (Actually, she was a fat peach.)
Other than steers, not much was neutered around our place, so we weren’t too surprised the morning “Trivia” dragged a litter of suckling pups out of the barn. Proving parentage with Australian Shepherds is sketchy as a single mating can produce a variety of blacks, reds, whites and merles. With Trivia, a dog of questionable virtue, there was likely more than one proud papa providing color to this batch.
Eight weeks passed and we found ranch jobs for every pup but the biggest white male. For five months we tripped over that dang pup. Finally, on a Saturday morning in April, a nice lady from Dayton decided to give this last dog a city job. That was the morning we made the unfortunate discovery that the white pup was 100% deaf and 95% blind. She wanted him anyway.
Then my dear mother made a decision that would haunt the Double Rafter for fifteen years. “This pup,” she explained to the town lady, “will require special training and care so we have decided to keep him.”
I did a double take. Dad did a double take. My two brothers did a double take. (Even the pup did a double take…and he was deaf.) Disappointed, the nice lady drove off and there we stood the adoptive caretakers of a deaf and blind stock dog.
Within a week he earned the name “Sonar” in hopes that he possessed a sixth sense that would prove useful to ranch work. Such was not the case. What he lacked in the ability to see or hear was made up by his desire to screw-up things.
Have you ever tried trailing yearlings with a deaf and blind, but eager stock dog? We would have spent most of the morning gathering the creek bottom with the leads just entering the corral, when Sonar’s sixth sense would tell him to guard the gate.
Neither my brothers nor I were allowed to swear around Mom, so we cursed to ourselves as we galloped back and forth to keep from spilling the heifers into the brush. “He responds to hand signals,” Mom would explain as she began wildly waving her arms overhead like she was snatching flies. Sonar just sat in the gate and marveled at the whole spectacle. If there was a doggie heaven, he was in it.
Finally, out of frustration, and knowing it would do absolutely no good, I would break down and do the unthinkable…swear at a deaf dog. “GET OUT OF THE GATE YOU SON-OF-A-BITCH!”
I told you that story so I could tell you this one: Of the freshman class in the ’07 legislature, I am the freshest; having been elected in a recount on November 28th. I am the conservative cow doctor who has owned Beartooth Veterinary Service on Main Street in Laurel for the past seventeen years. As a small businessman, right or wrong, I could steer my operation in any direction I choose. However, in the legislature I have to first reach a consensus and that could be as frustrating as trailing cows with a deaf and blind stock dog. So if you hear me scream, “GET OUT OF THE GATE!” Think nothing of it. It is just a flashback to my youth.
