We arrived home midafternoon on the Sunday after adopting Charlie. Also, we had been informed that our house would be the fourth place where Charlie had lived in less than a month’s time.   We don’t know much about his origins, except that he had been living with a divorced mother and her two year old boy. Their apartment was not big enough for a dog Charlie’s size, and she couldn’t afford to feed him. By 11 months old, he already weighed 95 pounds, which is quite a bit larger than the average, male German shepherd.

From there, Charlie went to live with some friends, who then passed him off to the German Shepherd rescue organization in Logan, Utah. He had been there about a week when I saw his ad on the web site, and another few days until we were able to bring him home. Transitions like that would be hard enough on any dog, but imagine going through all of that without being able to see what was coming at you, or who was taking care of you. Needless to say, Charlie was a little bit stressed and insecure.

At this time, Bob and I were renting an old, 1970’s model, single-wide mobile home. It was a bit of a mess, but we were just staying in it while we built our current house. We led Charlie around the small house and showed him were all the rooms were, and how the furniture was positioned, letting him smell everything as we went.

After we the toured inside the house, we walked Charlie on a leash around the property, allowing him to familiarize himself with the trees, vehicles, carport, shed, and every other item that might be unforgiving if a blind dog ran into it. The trailer sat on about an acre of land, which was part of a larger piece of property owned by Sarah and Bernie, our landlords. They were a very nice, elderly couple, who’s house was about only 150 yards from ours, down a gentle hill.

While we were out in the yard, Bernie must have seen us with Charlie, because not too long after we went back in the house, we heard a knock on the front door. Bernie was there holding his Shitzu. We weren’t sure how Charlie was going to react, so we tried to introduce them slowly. However, Charlie suddenly growled and then lunged, with snapping jaws, at the landlord and his dog.

We were completely shocked, because up to this point, Charlie hadn’t acted at all aggressively, and he had lived with several other dogs at the Logan GSD rescue house. I was so afraid the landlords were going to make us get rid of him. We explained that he was probably irritable from the long ride home, and that we should have let him relax for a few days before introducing him to other people. Fortunately, the landlord was very nice and seem to accept that as a reasonable explanation.

But, that was an important first lesson for us: We needed to put ourselves in his place and get his perspective on his entire world, and not just worry about what he might bump into. After all, pain comes in many forms.