Joanne Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> If you think about some of the odors dogs like,
> it's hard to come up with any odor that's putrid
> to a dog.

lol, true. My mom had a dog with a penchant for the cat litter box...ewwwww.

>A more complex sense of smell means
> more levels of perception and less
> distress/emotional reaction, less likelihood of
> being overwhelmed.

If you're in a more natural setting, you will find that dogs react to different stimuli on an odor basis. That's why people use dogs as sheep dogs (on the reservation as well). They can smell and respond to a predator far better than a human can.

>
> The observation of the dog's behavior is simply
> that: observation. What I'm commenting on as a
> "western" outlook is the sense I get that you are
> reaching for a fact-based, reliable, demonstrable
> western scientific type explanation of the
> phenomena here. The fact that some of your
> husband's relatives hold certain view does not
> make the views any less Western or modern.

I'm sorry but you're wrong to invalidate my husband's family's view in such a manner. You are relying on assumptions made by western or modern culture in regards to skinwalkers (ie the comparison of a skinwalker to a "navajo werewolf"). There are very, very few Navajos that will discuss them with outsiders. Keeping this in mind, you also have to look at the information that has been made available. Alot of the accounts are secondhand or worse or isolated incidents. My husband's family has been dealing with skinwalkers for almost 100 years, very much in the firsthand. There is a massive difference between "hearing about skinwalkers" and actually seeing one. The person who saw the skinwalker may say that it looked like a dog at first. Another person, after hearing the story, would say the skinwalker was a dog. If you don't like facts or appreciate observations based on decades of experience, then stick with the secondhand accounts.

> Also, don't forget that pets are often quite
> sensitive to the feelings of their owners. The
> whining and cowering of dogs or the hissing of
> cats could be a reaction to the fear/anxiety or
> anger they sense from their owners.

Both alert to a problem before their owners are aware. In the case of Sissy, her whining and whimpering beneath our window indicated that there was a problem. We were having a normal evening before then. In the case of my late cat jumping on my shoulder and hissing, I was sitting at the kitchen table, enjoying conversation with my husband. The cat was the one that recognized a problem first and it was through her actions that my husband looked in the direction of the window to see a face just outside. So, normal evening, all seems fine--animals react and then it goes topsy turvy. Not the other way around...

Stephanie





In every man there is something wherein I may learn of him, and in that I am his pupil.--Ralph Waldo Emerson