Thread by @QuinceMountain

Happy birthday to my undergrad philosophy prof, @HarryBrighouse1. My understanding of kids, families, education, & justice comes from studying with him; & it’s changed how I live & how I see others. I’ll never forget when he noticed my dog who’d been attending seminar for months.

Baruch was a Very Good Dog.

(here he is in his older age with BFF Alli, who raised him with me.)

I don't simply mean he was a delight.

He'd been in a bad accident when I first got him as a puppy from the pound when I was 17; his recovery required a month of painful daily care (debridement, etc). He seemed to understand somehow, & he learned to trust humans to a rare degree.

*The accident was 100% my fault. I won't recount ugly details rn, but I want to note this. I want everyone who made a mistake that hurt their pup to know that, even though you feel terrible & would do anything to change it, you're not alone, & it doesn't mean you don't love them.

Anyhow, he transitioned from a Highly Naughty puppy who, like, invented new ways to get into trouble daily and DNGAF if you tried to redirect him or call him over or whatever... he was going to run around the barn eating the remote control, befriending porcupines, etc...

... to a puppy (yes, a literal puppy no more than 6 months old by the time he recovered) who was wise beyond his years. He learned to anticipate our plans, and he would position himself accordingly (car, crate, wound care area, bathtub--whatever!) & wait---before we even asked.

Once, I left him in the cab of my truck (yes, the windows were cracked and it wasn't hot---don't even @ me) in the parking lot of the local vo-tech college where I was looking into an ASL night class...

I ended up chatting with the women at the front desk for maybe 15 minutes, and it was Whopper Wednesday, which was our night for dinner at BK (his and mine), and it was getting late, so he beeped the horn at me a couple times.

That was our thing. When he was way off hunting in the field and I needed his attention, I'd give two long blasts of the horn, and he'd come running. Eventually, he figured out to beep the horn at me, too. It was actually very useful.

I told the woman helping me sign up for the sign language course at the vo-tech that I'd better get going. She didn't believe me that the dog was the one beeping the horn, she thought it was some kind of code for "my spouse" or something (?!).

A couple mins later, he began beeping again, and she went out to the front door and looked, probably hoping to give me some friendly ribbing about my ridiculous dog excuse.

Of course, she saw him, paws at the wheel, beeping the horn and looking toward the door.

She called the other woman over to see, and I had to call the coroner because they were both ded.

They offered to sign Baruch up for an obedience course offered through the vo-tech. I think it was a joke.

BUTTTTTT this was way back in the day, and I was working for the old @WisCorps, which offered us reimbursement for courses (how I was able to take ASL)...so I considered it for about 5 seconds & thought it might be good/fun socialization for him since he had no dogs in his life.

Anyhow, fast forward to a couple obedience courses and a couple sign language courses later, and Baruch had an obedience competition championship under his belt. He soon won another and went on to retire (from our little regional circuit) undefeated.

We did not cheat during the obedience competitions, but...

We had a distinct advantage b/c there was some way in which (I don't remember the details) certain competitions were scored (or maybe teams were penalized?) according to the number of times they had to ask for a behavior or had to reinforce/redirect/whatever...

The weird thing about this was that it only counted verbal commands.

And, I mean, babies can learn signs---so can dogs. In fact, I think in many ways it's -easier- for them. They are generally quite attuned to body position.

So, we didn't cheat... but we were kind of unbeatable under those rules, unless one of the other teams began using signs / silent commands as well.

That said, he would have been Very Good in any case. He would heel off-leash perfectly and consistently; he would sit if he was out hunting 50 feet away from you and you said, "Baruch, sit." I could ask him to stay, go into a store, come back out, and he wouldn't have moved.

He was great to take to schools, nursing homes, busy cities, home with kids who had no experience with dogs. He was incredibly empathetic (even more than he was intelligent in an "understands commands/requests" kind of way), and I was always amazed to see how he taught children.

He once walked into a room with my friend's 2yo literally riding him--astride him like a horse, but folded forward and holding onto him somehow.

(I would not have arranged/allowed this--seems dangerous for pup back & kid. But catching them was hilarious & B def was enjoying it.)

Here's a pic of Baruch in Seattle, walking on leash with a friend who said she was terrified of dogs and had zero experience with them, but she wanted to work on that a little. This was their first day together. (I'm in the background on the left.)

So, somewhere between his obedience competition career and his visit to Seattle, I had him with me at @UWMadison while I worked toward a B.A. in philosophy.

He came with me to classes. I suspect a lot of people just assumed he was there for some official purpose, maybe that he in training for service. I didn't say that & he didn't wear a vest, but he was so poised and perfectly obedient that people just didn't question his access.

Someone on staff or faculty told me that long dead dog-lover had endowed major $$ for the University as long as dogs were allowed to roam freely on the lawn and maybe to go in buildings. I don't know if it was true, esp. the buildings part, but I just... decided to believe it.

I thought all my profs were well aware of Baruch -- his presence was never something I tried to hide. In larger lecture hall courses, he had throngs of students greeting him as we waited for class to start. Almost all the profs asked me about him, greeted him, loved having him...

Since @HarryBrighouse1 taught the smallest of my classes that semester---I think about 12 of us attended his fantastic philosophy of education seminar---my second course with him, among a group of philosophy grad and undergrad students who knew one another, in an intimate room...

I never had a doubt he was aware of Baruch. Like, it was a tiny room, and there was a tall 60-lb dog who everyone in the class greeted and talked about for like 10 minutes as he was preparing his notes and waiting for the bell or whatever.

bit.ly/2AzylSV

Like, it would have been IMpOSSIBLE not to know in December that B had been attending the class consistently since August.

I didn't necessarily think @HarryBrighouse1 didn't like dogs, tho he was the only one who never acknowledged Baruch. I just figured it was a British thing.

One day in December he brought his young daughter, M, to the class, can't recall why. She was maybe like 6 and hardly seemed old enough to dig watching a dude stand in front of a whiteboard and lecture for three solid hours---though for some reason she seemed quite unphased.

I was excited to meet M b/c I learned from @HarryBrighouse1's random comments about his own parenting in addition to his lectures/readings on family and education...

He mentioned her upcoming b-day once, and someone asked what he was getting her. He replied with his answer (some kind of a $5 trinket he thought she'd enjoy) along with a lengthy riff on the merits of not spending all kinds of money when lil kids don't even know the difference.

Anyhow, back to the time @HarryBrighouse1 brought M to the seminar... (i hope you're able to figure out twitter threads b/c for some reason this thing keeps untagging you, professor---sorry abt that)

She sat next to Baruch, and she was petting him and stuff during the seminar, just kind of delighting in being next to this big friendly dog while her dad was up in front of the room doing whatever he does...

Meanwhile @HarryBrighouse1 was I-shit-you-not maybe 75 minutes into a lecture... I don't recall the contents, but it was a bit technical & he was writing a lot on the whiteboard, and then he turned to look at his daughter M, prolly to make sure she was still in the room...

And he just, like, did an about face from the whiteboard and pointed with a lanky stiff arm and was like, "THERE'S A DOG IN THE ROOM!!!!"

I promise you that it still did not occur to me that he hadn't known there was a dog in the room.

I thought it was some kind of opening provocation to a thought exercise, or a punchline to some philosophy joke I was supposed to know.

Brighouse was quite an engaging lecturer and I'd grown up watching Fawlty Towers, so maybe it was weird un-American humor.

I found it hilarious, whatever the reason.

His physical comedy was _on point_.

If you didn't know what was going on, you really might believe he had no idea there had been a large dog in the room that his daughter had been petting for over an hour.

Those wacky Brits!

Cue a confused several minutes of him "No, really: there's a dog in the room." and students saying "Baruch has been here ALL SEMESTER." and "Didn't you notice your daughter was petting a dog, like, immediately?" and "Do you need your eyes checked?" and "Wait, are you serious rn?"

And this thread is basically everything you need to know before beginning a philosophy course.

(Happy birthday, @HarryBrighouse1! Thank you again for all those things you told us. I wish you a year of sweetness & light. Best regards to M.)