This week I had the honor of yapping with a real, No Woof, Honest-To-Rin Tin Tin hero! Eik Shamoo’s what’s called a German German Shepherd. I know! I hadn’t heard that either. It’s used for German Shepherds who were actually born in Germany.
As me and my assistant pulled into the parking lot of Eik’s building, a lady came walking toward us, with a big, handsome pooch trotting along beside her. It was HIM, and he totally looked like a Hero. They came right up to us, and me and Eik executed the On-Leash-Wag-And-Sniff.
“Guten Morgen!” he said. “Ich bin Eik Shamoo und dies ist meine Mutter, Tonia. Willkommen!”
He noticed my clueless smile. “Oh, sorry. I speak three languages (DogEnglish, DogGerman and Cat) and sometimes I forget who I’m yapping with. We are so very happy to meet you. Let’s go on in then.”
Eik’s apartment was bright and welcoming. I was getting my notebook ready when a black cat wandered in, came right up to Eik and calmly began to groom his toes. Eik’s foot was almost the size of the cat’s whole head. I was startled and dropped my pen.
“Um …” I managed.
“Mr. Bonzo, I’d like you to meet my little brother, Mickey D,” Eik said. Mickey D gave me a brief glance and got back to grooming Eik’s footpads.
Retrieving my pen and my concentration, I said, “A pleasure, Mr. D. Now then … So, Eik, I hear you have a great story, that you’re a real hero.”
“Ya, ya, I have had some good fortune and interesting adventures. But I only did what any other well-trained German Shepherd would do.”
I encouraged him to start at the beginning, about how he got from Germany all the way to Florida.
“I was born in Germany. My full name is Eik vonBarak. At a very young age, I was purchased by a kennel in Washington State and trained in Schutzhund.”
“Say, what?” I blurted.
“Schutzhund is German for ‘protection dog.’ It’s a way of testing hunde, er, dogs, to see if they have what it takes for police work. Seems I didn’t, so my owner sold me to a kennel in the Green Mountains of Vermont. The owner wanted a watch dog, which she thought would come natural to me, since I was a German Shepherd. Unfortunately, by the time I was 3, she realized I wasn’t ferocious enough. Back in Schutzhund training, I had miserably failed my Bite Work course. You see, Bonzo, I’ve always felt, why bite someone when you can just put your mouth gently around their arm and say, ‘OK, let’s just talk about this.’ In my heart, I’m truly a shepherd, NOT a policehund.”
“Ah, yes. Then what happened?”
“Bonzo, it was FATE. Meine Mutter had been searching for just the right German Shepherd. She’d set her laptop down when a blog popped up with a conversation about a kennel in the Green Mountains. Seems the owner had this ‘low drive’ pooch (that was me!) Long story short, somehow meine Mutter sensed I was The One. The owner flew me down, and at last I had a Forever Home.“
“Tell about the rescues,” I encouraged him. He was obviously a modest pooch.
“Well, every morning and evening, I patrol the west side perimeter of our complex, with meine Mutter. It comes natural to me, and it seems to make the humans here feel safe and secure. One evening, shortly after we moved here, I was making my usual rounds, when I sensed something was wrong. I took off over to Building I. As I’m trained to do, I pointed my ears and stared straight at the door.
“Meine Mutter didn’t see anything wrong, so she tried to get me to move, she tugged my leash and gave the commands in English and German. But I didn’t budge. Finally she gave up and entered the building. I immediately dashed off down the hall to the elevators. A lady was lying there. She had fallen and was hurt. I lay down right beside her to comfort and protect her until a bunch of humans came to take her to the krankenhaus, er, people hospital.“
Suddenly, Mickey D spoke up. “Hey, Eik, tell Bonz about ME and Sammi!”
“Yes, please do,” I urged, writing as fast as I could.
“Ya, ya. We were driving back from North Carolina and had stopped at a McDonald’s in Georgia. Crossing the parking lot, I sensed something and gave the ears-straight-ahead alert!”
“It was ME! It was ME!” said Mickey D.
Eik laughed. “He was a tiny schwarz fluffball – fit in the palm of meine Mutter’s hand. We were in a pickup truck, so Mickey D rode all the way home – 7 hours – right behind the driver’s seat, curled up on my back. It was comfy for both of us and we’ve been together ever since. He grooms my whiskers, face and paw pads and I protect him. I also located a lost Persian, Sammi, here at our complex, who’d been missing for a week. The owner’d put out flyers, and was so happy to have Sammi back home safe and sound.”
“Eik,” I said with great sincerity, “you are a true hero, and an inspiration to pooches everywhere!”
Till next time,
The Bonz
