Let's go back:

I didn't just go to the prison and walk out with Drake.  The Paws in Prison group (trainers) and Diamond Dachshund Rescue of Texas (owners), both had me fill out an application.  The owners came over to my house, checking for any dangers that I might have inside or outside my house.  I had two spots in my fence they wanted me to secure, and a pond they were concerned about.  After passing my home inspection, Paws in Prison wanted me to take lessons on communicating with him, before I took him home.  They had worked with him for six months, and done a marvelous job.  They had not only calmed the beast, but were able to teach him ten commands and twelve tricks, by touch.  After I met him and the group, I was amazed.  They sit on the floor with this adorable little deaf puppy, with no eyes to speak of, and he performed his routine perfectly, with no hesitation.  I had never seen anything like it.  The communication between him and his trainer was so precise.  I had never taught my sighted dogs, with hearing, half of those exercises, and I had tried.  They were able to teach this little dog, with none of the usual tools we have as humans.  The love and patience that these two girls, women, gave to Drake had turned him into a regular Einstein.

As a young girl reading about Albert Einstein, it was always Einstein the man that fascinated me.  Most people read about him because of his genius, me it was the way he lived his life.  When I was a child I did not understand people that functioned differently. I went to a parochial school and we were all encouraged to be conformist.   So when I would read that he would not wear socks, would never dress properly or he couldn't spell.  I would think, if he is smart enough to figure out the law of relativity, how could he not dress himself, learn to spell and be like everyone that I knew in my small world.  It was not easy to understand as a child.  It was not until I was an adult did I begin to learn, different was not odd, and did not threaten how I lived my life.  Because of the contradictions, and genius that I saw in Albert Einstein, I thought of him immediately that day I met Drake. 

 

After showing me his skills, they began to tell me about the other side of Drake.  As I sat and listened to them tell me about temper tantrums, stomping his front paws and spinning out of control, I was watching him play ball all by himself.  He would shove the ball, with his nose, and then find it by scent, and shove it again.  He happily did that for about thirty minutes while we talked.  How very wonderful that he just was able to live his life, and was so adjusted to the darkness.   However, when he was not able to find the ball, I saw my first fit.  Looking back and comparing what was to come, it was not bad.  That day it startled me in contrast to his genius.   To be able to put his little brain to the test of figuring out these commands and then to see the basic, rawest lost of any kind of reason.  Why, I could only think how could any of us ever understand this dark and silent world that he had been living in. With no love or guidance that he could understand.  I was completely ready for the challenge .  I wanted not only to help him.  I wanted to continue the journey that he had only started at the prison with these loving ladies. They had given me such a head start and I wanted to understand him.  The commands that they had taught him had won him the Canine Good Citizen award.  The Good Citizen award.  This was a dog that six months earlier was banished to a back yard living a lonely life.  Now he was living with humans, understanding commands, potty trained and obviously the dog could learn anything I wanted to teach him.  He was only limited by me and I had a direct line to Machelle and she had a direct line to her whole team.