Lassie was probably the smartest and bravest dog that has ever lived. She starred in movies in the 40's and television all through the 50's and 60's. Each tv show or movie had generally the same theme, somebody in Lassie's family would get in dire trouble (fall off a horse and break a leg, slip on a mountain side and fall to a ledge where certain death was soon to happen, or some such dire emergency) and the person would then look at Lassie and say something like: "Go get Timmy, Lassie!" or "Go get the doctor, Lassie", or ..... and of course Lassie would turn on its heels and rush home or rush to town or wherever, bark at that person and of course the person would be eating or teaching or something but they would listen to the barking and somehow know that "Lassie is trying to tell us something, something's wrong" and then they would scurry after her and eventually save the person in peril. It was amazing. But we all loved it.
Now in my family, I have 2 granddogs, Judy and Max. Judy's masters are my daughter Anne and her husband Jake, and Max's masters are my son Peter and his wife, Cassie. Judy is a border collie, very smart, fast, playful, tireless. Max is an adopted lhaso apso/shitzu mix that is a wonderful companion, great lapdog, full of energy and pep but just learning how to obey. The whole gang was down for Christmas and Anne and Jake were out in the back yard playing with Judy and Max. I decided to join them and as I opened the door to the garage I saw Max walking ahead of Anne (untethered) and I knew this wasn't good.
This wasn't good because the garage door was open and as soon as Max saw that he took off! He ran directly down the driveway towards the street. I feared of course a car would be coming at that exact second and he would get squashed for sure. So I took off running after him to "save him". Of course I couldn't catch him. Anne saw the same thing and she took off and easily passed me up and now we are both running down the street after Max, who had taken a left turn when he got to the street. All the while I'm thinking, this is terrible, how are going to stop Max?
Of course I'm thinking the worst: Max will run for miles, we're never going to catch him. I stopped, put my hands on my knees and had nothing left in my tank. Jake by this time was also in the street and was yelling at Anne, "keep runing, you're catching up!". Wishful thinking, no way was she going to catch Max. Max had a chance to run free and he was going for it.
Judy, while still in the backyard, when she realized that Jake had left the door to the back yard open and she saw Jake running down the driveway must have thought, "something's up, I've got to get into this, this looks like fun", so she must have took off after Jake running through the garage down the driveway.
Remember me, I'm standing in the street not knowing what's going to happen. But then I looked back saw Judy come roaring off the driveway and turn down the street. I saw the look on her face and I swear I heard the William Tell Overture (remember that would play at the beginning of the Lone Ranger tv show) playing in the background. She, without stopping, saw what we were doing and raced down the street past Jake, me, and Anne at breakneck speed and caught up to Max in about 2 seconds and in one quick move turned and stopped in front of Max, barked once which froze Max instantly. Anne then came over, picked up Max and the emergency was ended just like that. I can only imagine what was going through Max's mind at that moment, freedom to run and then STOP now! Judy had figured out what was happening and knew exactly what to do. Max was safe Judy had done the whole thing in about 3 seconds!
Judy is Lassie.
