This is the second part of my Lucy story..........her middle years....................scroll down if you want to read the first part.....................
On most days, Lucy rarely strayed far from her front lawn or her food source. She patiently and consistently kept an eye on her family, especially at night when she would ensure all was well in slumberland. Click, click, click of her nails up and down the hardwood hallway, until she’d settle down in the doorway of my son’s room, only to snore like a lumberjack with a deviated septum. Since we were used to her loud Flintstone-like snores, it rarely woke any of us up, though the noise was known to scare off visiting guests. Like fish, guests start to send off an odour after three days anyways, so we all considered it a good thing and never warned a newcomer!
Friends and family always commented on Lucy’s demeanour. Always friendly in search of a pat or a belly rub and always willing to warm someone’s feet, she would be described as laid back and nonchalant. Once she greeted someone at the front door, bark free, she’d park herself in the middle of the action and promptly fall asleep. In fact, she was so relaxed that when she shared her living space with our escaped, free-range hamster for 4 months, she took no notice. They were like two ships passing in the night and day. Any other dog would’ve devoured the furry little rodent, but not Lucy. I think it was the same attitude she displayed with other dogs. If the humans didn’t mind or pay much attention to them, why should I? Weird.
There were times that she would show her excitement. Every time her litter buddy, my husband, walked through the door, Lucy would get a good wag going. In fact, she somehow knew when it was 4:30 pm, because like clockwork, Lucy would awake from wherever she was slumbering and make her way to the front window to perch and wait the arrival of her family at the end of the day. If my husband was out in the evening, Lucy wouldn’t settle fully until he was home safe and sound.
If you really wanted to get a rise out of her however, to test her energy mettle, you needed a body of water. Naturally. It’s the Lab in her. Yeah, she was even known to sneak away from her front yard, and head down to the river, which happens to be across a busy road, for a quick dip. But, her favourite watering hole was in Spencer’s Island. As soon as her paws hit the beach, her lumbering gait would turn into a quick trot while she made a direct bee-line to the shore and into the cold salty water. Ahhhhhh………….
She definitely had slowed down after her slipped disc drama—to a point where we decided it may be a good idea to get her a buddy that would help keep her spry and young at heart. So, one spring when Lucy was 8 years old we brought home a blonde upstart pup. Born on Easter Sunday, Lily pounced her way into the hearts of the humans, but prompted the first growl ever to emit out of Lucy. For the first time, Lucy found her inner bark. We didn't know she had it in her.
Lily jumped and romped and teased and tried to wrestle with the old girl and Lucy would have none of it. Whenever they were let loose in the backyard, Lily made every attempt to get Lucy to play by barking and nipping and trying to jump over her. Finally, Lucy would chase after her just to get rid of the pain in the butt......to no avail. The blonde was not going away. Finally, more drastic measures were attempted by our cunning canine. Whenever no one was paying attention, Lucy clutched a puppy toy in her mouth and slipped away down the hill to bury it in a neighbour's garden. This went on for a couple of weeks until one day, the neighbour knocked on the door. Puppy toy in hand, he explained what had been occurring. He was very nice about it, but he also explained that lumbering Lucy, who was the size of a small brown bear, was frightening his wife. For the first time since her puppy days, Lucy was tied up on the property.
That fall, she ran away. I had come home for lunch and let the dogs outside, neglecting to put Lucy on her chain. She hardly ever wandered, and I thought I could keep an eye on her. Within seconds, she was gone. After calling her name and not finding her, I went back to work confident that she would be back sitting on the deck in the sun at the end of the day. She wasn’t. We took turns searching for her all evening………..along the highway, along the sideroads, up and down the streets and through the mini-home park by our house. We checked along the walking trail and down by the river. No Lucy. She had simply vanished. There was no sleep that night.
The next morning, my husband called the dog pound. No luck. However, he serendipitously crossed paths at his office with a neighbour and asked her if she had seen Lucy. She told my husband that there was a sign on the mailboxes close to her home indicating that someone had found a dog……….could it be? My husband rushed back to our neighbourhood, grabbed the phone number off the sign and called the number.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, yes they did have a Chocolate Lab. She had shown up around noon the day before. They tried to find the owner and had in fact taken her for a long walk to see if she would saunter in the direction of her home. When she didn’t take the bait (it turned out their walk took them as close as seeing distance to our house!) they took her home, gave her dinner and allowed her to sleep on their couch. They had fallen in love with her gentleness and laid back demeanor.
What are we at now? That was the third time that I had thought we had lost her. I was so relieved to see her. I was even grateful that she managed to get underfoot every time I was making dinner, or stood in the hallway in the middle of the morning traffic. Her overnight stay with her newfound fans once again made me realize that I was becoming one of those eccentric British dog lover types. I was a believer in the idea that I was a member of a family of 6……….4 humans and 2 dogs……..a family. Funny, after the runaway incident, Lucy must’ve come to terms with this concept too, because she started showing her compassion to the blonde upstart. Lily was now in her family. She had a new family member to look after.
And while Lily ensured that the old girl kept a spring in her step, it was then that Lucy began to teach Lily the art of laid-backness. We were all grateful.
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