In the Beginning

It is true. In the beginning it was hard to tell us apart, dogs and wolves. We looked like wolves. We were wolves, evolved from wolves. Man knew us by our eyes and lips, how we entered his camps.

Over time our scent began to change. The old ones say that our scent changed as soon as we began to eat with man, to sleep in his camps, to lick his wounds, care for his young, he for our pups.

Wolves never lived with the Neanders as we did with man. They hunted together, fought together when the war began. But they ate apart. That is what made us and man different. That is how we prevailed, our connection.

Over time man sought to enhance us. He bred us, and cross-bred us. Our form began to change. We took more forms, more colors, sizes, temperaments, coats, abilities.

Wolves considered us strays in the beginning. We had left the packs, our own kind, to go dig in the trash of another species, a species that was loud and noxious, and very dangerous.

Wolves say that we dogs get our bones from man, that man is our bone source. Wolves get their own bones, they claim. In this they stake much of their pride.

Last spring in the Black Hills a wolf told me that neos are to dogs what we were to wolves. She said they would stay out of it, allow the neos to wipe us and man out, if not for the fact that neos seem intent on wiping out wolves too.