Asking Permission is Appreciated

Last night I had the most pleasant dream, I woke up smiling and every time I think about the dream, it continues to make me happy.  I'm one of those people who dream a lot but my dreams, when I remember them, are not usually what I would categorize as fun or pleasant.  They are intense and weird at best and are often disturbing and unsettling.  So I was pretty excited to wake up from a dream that was so enjoyable.

In the dream, I was swimming with dolphins and then one of the dolphins asked, "Can I kiss you?" and I said "Sure!" and the sweet dolphin kissed me on the cheek.  The strange thing was that the dolphin was talking out loud so it wasn't just me who heard the question but the other people who were with me heard it as well.  The dolphins brought us back to the dock where other people were waiting for us and when the dolphins said goodbye, again, it was out loud so everyone could hear it.

Then the dream flipped to a new scene and I was sitting on the floor of a room and a bunch of raccoons were there.  At one point, one of the raccoons came up to me, stood on his hind legs and said, "Can I hug you?" and I smiled and said "Of course you can!" and he proceeded to put his arms around my neck and give me the nicest hug.  Once again, he was talking out loud and all the other people in the room could hear him talking.

When I woke up, my first thought was "Wow, that was so sweet!" and then my mind wandered into that "I wonder why I dreamt about that" territory.  There seemed to be a theme of them asking for permission before they touched me so I pondered that for a moment. Then a flash of insight came . . . animals like to be asked for permission before we touch them.

It is something that I sensed early on and I have tried to always be respectful in my interactions with animals but when I first began fostering Kino, he reinforced the importance of this in a big way.  If you reached out to touch him, he would try to bite you so I learned very quickly that I needed to always ask before touching him.  I also learned that I needed to honor his choice if he didn't want to be touched.

For instance, he has had ear infections off and on over the last 6 years and I always say, "Can I look in your ear?"  To this day, sometimes the answer is still "no" which he indicates either by running away from me or grabbing a toy and shaking it violently.  Sometimes if I explain why I want to look in his ear and assure him that "looking isn't going to hurt" he will allow it but not always.  I know it is important to respect his wishes so I never push beyond that.

As I contemplated this over my coffee this morning, I realized that he ingrained this in me quite strongly.  When he isn't feeling well, I will often say, "Do you need a hug?" and I wait to see if his tail wags.  If his tail doesn't move, I said "Ok, maybe another time." If his tail DOES wag, I give him a nice warm embrace, which usually makes his tail wag even more.  The important thing is that I let the choice be his.

I am still not 100% sure why I was treated to such a fun dream last night. My only thought is that the message was about mutual respect and how asking permission before touching is an important part of it, regardless of whether we are the human or the animal.  What I am 100% sure of is that talking to animals out loud and receiving loving gestures from them was the coolest dream I ever had.  I hope that it happens again!