Page 29 - LeMagWinter2015

Decibel

The
Helper
Briard

Part 2
by Juliane Essig

A picture is worth a thousand words; and just like a picture, An hour into the drive, we were already halfway to the
Decibel is a study of light and dark, of color and contrast, and airport, and still we had no name. I had tried various physics
often it helps to add a few words in the caption to impart con- terms: Tesla, Newton and Pascal didn’t work for a girl. Celerity,
text. Becquerel, Coulomb – they’d get misspelled, misunderstood,
Her story began with darkness. and muddled, and that’s just by me. Watt, Hertz, Siemens… just
We were not off to a happy start in early 2010. Our big Briard NO.
Barley – my Baby – had to be put down after a violent but short
illness. Winter was harsh, and I hate the cold. Life pretty much Finally someone said “Isabelle”. Not bad… Unique,
sucked. But when spring became a reality rather than a calendar easy to holler, didn’t sound like any of the other dogs. Only… it
decree, we knew that mourning was over sounded
and that we needed to add a new dog to our bunch. Three was prissy to me. And it didn’t have anything to do with music or
simply not enough. physics or any of the other ‘fun’ I had retired for. And then… it
We contacted Terry Miller and Dominique Dube in Ohio and became Decibel. Absolutely perfect – here’s why:
became part of their extended family. Now, we had trusted Terry
and Dominique to pick out a puppy that would fit into our lives Feel the Noize… and yes, that IS how you spell it.
and during a phone consultation had decided that ‘the clear Decibel is named for what is important to me in my (new,
orange bitch that eats like a pig’ sounded right. I like to have the retired) phase of life, a combo of physics and (really loud)
key to a puppy’s heart in the shape of a Milkbone. Food-motiva- music. Feeling the noise (oops, noize, I mean, noize) can
tion makes for easy training. ! be interpreted as detecting/quantifying the noise (sound
Decibel - What’s in a name? ! intensity) and that’s physics. Or if you’re old like me, and
Decibel’s registered name is Popsakadoo Déjà Vu Fricassee. It like rock music loud enough to feel it, and that’salso about
should have been …Feel the Noize, but we didn’t know that Decibels, as in AC/DC’s song “Decibel… the history of
then. When we drove to the airport to pick up our precious rock ‘n’ roll”.
Briard pup that Cinco de Mayo, we didn’t have a name for her.
We had recently lost Barley, so I didn’t want a “B” name; at home
were Maggie (mutt), Ralphy (Briard, owner give-up), and Skee-
ter (possum/dog hybrid, we need to get him DNA tested).
I wanted a name that was unique, and that reflected the new
direction my life after Barley was taking: I had quit my job to do
“the farm thing” and have fun. And to raise a Briard pup. Since
you know the breed, you know that they need a lot of socializa-
tion, and I was going to do it right.

Le Magazine 27