Finn and Edith had agreed on one thing. Well they might have agreed on more if they ever had a chance to talk which wasn’t very often on account of they were both chasing each other all the time. But they had agreed on one thing, it was going to take a while to train their humans.

“Some of the rules are ridiculous.” Edith had said.

“Keep your voice down.” Finn whispered.

“No need to whisper Finn, humans don’t understand dog. We can say whatever we want right in front of them.” Edith was laughing now. “Watch this.”

“No talk. No talk.” she barked right at Pat and Lori, who were busily talking about something or other. Finn howled with laughter.

“No bark. No bark.” Lori and Pat said almost in unison and that just made Finn and Edith laugh even harder.

“Oh Edith, we’re going to have such a fun summer.”

                                                    Edith and Finn, Adventures with a Capital A

I’ve written two children’s books, ‘Edith and Finn Adventures with a Capital A’ and ‘Edith and Frankie More Adventures with a Capital A’ and I’ve written them in ‘dog’. Of course I did, my characters are all dogs, puppies actually and I had to learn their language before I could understand what they were saying. And then to make things even more difficult it turned out one of my characters in both books swears like a trooper. Now when you remember that this is a children’s book you might begin to understand my challenge. 

I actually approached this methodically although my neighbours were clearly confused. I do a lot of writing at our seaside cottage in Deep Bay BC. On a sunny day it is idyllic, right on the ocean. I set up the laptop on our patio, looking directly out to the Gulf Islands east of Vancouver Island. It is very special. So on this particular sunny morning I was sharply focused on a singular task for my book ‘Edith and Finn Adventures with a Capital A’.  If my character had to swear in my children’s book!, then I had to find a way to make that work.

For the next several hours I could be heard saying the most vulgar words out loud and then working endless phonetic iterations of those words, trying to find some palatable version for my book. And while we are talking about this, why is it that the letter F is so prominent in most profanity. Poor F has been consigned to the company of the letter K through history and that seems so unfair. But I digress. 

“fhluckle”

NO

“fluggle”

NO

“fluck”

HARD NO!

It was not easy. As the morning turned to midday and the sun rose overhead I began to draw the attention of my neighbours. We live where ‘Schitt’s Creek meets a seniors home’ so we’re all discretely watching out for one another. Safe to say that when one of us spends some time swearing endlessly and out loud, trying on different versions of the same words, writing them down on paper, and then vigorously scratching the words off all the while muttering to oneself, it is bound to get some attention.

“No, that won’t work”

“No, no, no …”

“Oh, hard no!”

Now don’t get me wrong, most of the residents where we live at the Deep Bay RV Park in Bowser BC, are seventy plus. Few of the male residents have slept through the night for years now and many of them swear out loud a lot, and for not much reason but this was different. I was sitting by myself and swearing out loud, to no one in particular. That was the disturbing part for my neighbours. When their husbands swore they would most often have a target for their displeasure. I neither had a target nor did I seem displeased, I was just swearing out loud. For several hours. One could hardly blame them. It wasn’t long before Jody and Mary, two of our friends quietly approached my wife,

“Mac, is Tony okay?

“I think so, why do you ask?”

“Well, we were out on our deck and we couldn’t help but notice that Tony seemed to be swearing to himself, out loud. I mean it went on for quite a while.”

“Oh no, thank you for your concern, but really don’t be concerned. He was just trying to learn how to swear for a children’s book he’s writing.” 

That must have been a throughly confusing answer but the answer it was and out friends graciously retired back to their happy hour libations, no doubt whispering their concerns to one another about this rather odd new couple in #33.

My only other company that day were various seagulls and eagles and herons doing various flybys over the patio. From time to time they’d ‘let go’ which let’s face it, must be great sport. I mean think about it, if you were a bird tell me you wouldn’t try to bomb sitting duck human beings down below! When all was said and done I had created my SCB vocabulary (Safe for Children’s Books) and I was ready to move on with my story.

Lots of people said Ross swore a lot but even if he did Finn had never understood what he was saying, they were very confusing words. Finn liked simple words, like the ones with one syllable. Humans made words so complicated and one thing he did know was that human swear words had lots of syllables. He remembered the day Ross had hit his thumb with a hammer when he was fixing up his cabana at Deep Bay,

“Phluggledemuck! Muppphhhledumphhh!”, he shouted and Finn had to stop himself laughing at Ross, it was so funny. And then he bent a metal saw horse one day just resting on it for a minute,

“Phluggledemuck! Crunkleemuuupphers!”, Ross shouted out loud as he pulled himself off the ground, “Who the phluggledorph makes these things!?”

                                                      Edith and Finn Adventures with a Capital A

But all that aside I really have come to think that dogs talk. That we don’t understand what they’re saying doesn’t mean they are not talking. Our typical response to dogs when they’re trying to talk to us is a sharp rebuke.

“No bark!”

It must be so frustrating for them. Can you imagine warning your child to ‘watch out’ or ‘look out’ or ‘that man is dangerous, stay away from him!’ only to be greeted with, “Stop shouting!”. Undoubtedly dogs are behind humans in the communication progress continuum. History currently records that we first began to gather and communicate over thirty thousand years ago, at first of course without words. We didn’t have language, we had no vocabulary, we couldn’t write. What we had were sounds and then pictures and then thousands of years later we developed words and vocabulary. And then we learned how to write and print and from there our ability to talk and communicate and record written words took off like rocket ship. Since we began this journey some we have progressed dramatically and we now enjoy an extraordinarily sophisticated capacity to communicate with sounds and what we’ve come to call ‘words’. 

But think back. What did we sound like so many millennia ago when all we had were crude primal noises with which to communicate? It is not hard to imagine that we may have made sounds that would today be called ‘barking’. Without doubt they would have been crude monosyllabic, guttural sounds but they would have been made in order to send a message. To whom that message was intended it doesn’t matter, friend, foe, potential companion it matters not, sounds are what we have always made to convey what we are thinking. Calling those sounds a ‘bark’ doesn’t make it any less an attempt to communicate. Where there is sound, as we have shown, ‘talk’ cannot far behind. 

And dogs are making real and obvious progress. Watch your pet change its tone, playfully dodge in and out inviting you to play, show anger, show fear, ‘sound’ as though she is laughing when you rub her belly, trill with his voice as though he’s saying ‘oh c’mon pleeeeaassse!’. Dogs are doing their part. It’s us. We are the ones stuck in the past, rooted in our perception that dogs bark and barks are annoying and that’s the way it is. 

And then Ross Angelucci came up to Frankie. She knew about Ross from listening to Darrel and Jarrod and Toby telling funny stories about Ross when he was a Fire Captain in Nanaimo. Frankie remembered how all the humans laughed when Ross told stories because he swore so much. He was famous and he loved dogs and every dog knew about Ross’s black lab Jet. Now there was a real hero. Jet had saved Edith and Winnie from a Mountain Lion when they were on an Adventure with a Capital A. He’d given up his own life to save the puppies. And Ross was so sad but he knew Jet had done the right thing. Ross was a good man.

“Where you been Frankie, where have you been?” 

Ross wrapped Frankie’s face up with his two big hands, “Phluuuuugggellldepoof! You’re all tired and you look like you’ve been in some tough places. Where’s Toby and Anya and Freddy? Do you know girl? Do you know?”

“Phluuuuugggellldepoof!?” Frankie thought, “That must be one of those swear words Ross uses. It was funny.”

Frankie barked and barked and barked some more but no matter how loud she was, none of them seemed to understand what she was trying to tell them. Frankie ran toward all three of the firefighters and then ran back toward the gate at the back of the garden. And she did it again. And she did it again. And then she did it again.

“They don’t understand dog,” Frankie thought to herself, “How am I going to get them to understand?”

“She’s trying to tell us something, boys.” Ross finally said, “I think she wants us to follow her. Maybe that’s why she’s here. She wants to lead us back to Toby and Anya and little Freddy.

Frankie couldn’t believe her ears. They had finally figured out what she was trying to tell them, “Humans need to learn dog. I bark, you follow. What is so complicated about that!” she thought to herself.

                                      Edith and Frankie More Adventures with a Capital A

And when I say ‘it’s us’ I really mean ‘it’s me’. I confess I am not the best dog owner. Fact is I’m not patient enough and too rooted to my need for obedience. My wife Mac though, now she gets dogs. She is kind and empathetic and she puts in the work trying to understand our dog Edith. She’s a dog whisperer, if there is such a thing. She trusts that as she gets older she is getting better at communication. Edith I mean, not my wife. Oh my God! I just fell through my own trap door. My wife is a great communicator. Can we move on!

I am sure of this though. The most compelling sound for us is the sound of the human voice. I spent decades in radio, a now obsolete technology, but radio succeeded where it did because it understood that the most compelling medium for us all is the sound of the human voice. And technology aside, that will never change. Since recorded history, back to the cave hieroglyphics of ancient times depicting people around a fire, human beings have gathered to share, eat and tell stories. Over millennia guttural primal sounds became meaningful, communicating happiness and anger, laughter and arousal, the spoken word evolving into what we know today. Had we heard those sounds it is not too much of a reach to imagine they would have sounded like a bark. So if this was true for humans how could it not be true of dogs. It is simply that they are behind us some. Their brains are too small. Of course the are, as were ours. The part of the brain they would need for ‘talk’ is underdeveloped. As were ours.

“So much of language is unspoken. So much of language is comprised of looks and gestures and sounds that are not words. People are ignorant of the vast complexity of their own communication.”

– Enzo, ‘The Art Of Racing In The Rain’

If you have read ‘The Art of Racing in the Rain’ by Garth Stein, you’ll know Enzo, the dog. The book doesn’t work without Enzo and without us accepting that dogs can imagine and think and use words. I know it’s a stretch but surely if we can imagine ‘Enzo’, the realm of possibility may be not too far ahead.

Use your imagination, which is of course, another intellectual function which has taken tens of thousands of years to develop. Imagine dogs thirty thousand years from now. You see, it is not inconceivable that we will be able to ‘talk’ with dogs through some mechanism of developed vocabulary and language.

Frankie spoke up, “You know, it would be so much better if humans could learn dog. We try to tell them all the time but they just don’t get it, do they?”

“I know,” said Winnie, “Maybe they’ll get smarter in the future, maybe their puppies will understand what we’re saying. Maybe Freddy will be one of the first humans to learn dog.”

“I love that.” said Edith.

“Me too.” replied Frankie.

“Me three.” barked Winnie.

And they all laughed.

Freddy had wandered over to the three puppies and sat down, “Ah-lo Eth-ith,” he said, patting her head with his human paw. “Ninnie, No Bark.” and that made all of them laugh some more. And then Freddy laid down on Frankie’s chest and Frankie put her big paw over him like she wanted to keep Freddy safe. 

“You know what I think girls?” Edith asked.

“Think?” said Winnie and Frankie together, “You just can’t stop yourself can you?” 

“He’s only two but I think Freddy already understands dog. And we can teach him a lot because we’re all going to spend the rest of our lives together. Together forever!”

“I love that,” said Frankie. She was so excited she nearly knocked Winnie over with her tail, “How long is forever?”

The puppies looked at each other and howled with laughter and then they curled up together with Freddy in the middle, three puppies and Freddy, one great big Furball of Friendship with a Capital F.

“I like thinking about being together forever.” said Frankie.

“Me too.” said Winnie.

“Me three.” barked Edith.

And they all laughed.

POSTSCRIPT

Both of Tony Peyton’s children’s books are available on Amazon and all other major publishing platforms worldwide.

Edith and Finn Adventures with a Capital A

Edith and Frankie More Adventures with a Capital A