Chapter 32 (Animals I’ve Known and Loved, cont.)

G.P.

Our neighborhood always seemed to be in a transitional state--a house up for sale--another just settled in. The Ashes had moved in next door about the time I got Wendy. They had two girls close to Joanna’s age and a toddler around Alby’s age. They had no pets, but with their love of animals they were destined to have the next stray that came by. Thus they acquired an excellent rabbit dog--a beagle they named Barney. Barney hunted rabbits without a hunter accompaniment, and like most beagles, lost track of everything else while deep in a maze of fading rabbit paths, he somehow snapped out of his trance in our neighborhood…and was completely lost. After a half-hearted attempt to find his owners, Barney was adopted by the Ashes, and Barney became Wendy’s teacher. It was a shame that I wasn’t a rabbit hunter, for the expert rabbit dog that Wendy became. In the process of Barney’s teachings, however, I thought I had lost Wendy as a family dog. She would leave together with Barney first thing in the morning and come back only for food and rest.

Wendy’s first heat put an end to her hunting for awhile, as I did not want her to mate so young, she was still less than a year old, and kept her tied, and when she was inside we were careful not to let her out without a leash attached. Not knowing the timing of her fertile period… or should I say her lustful period, she escaped on her fourteenth day. She was so obedient beforehand, we got a little careless. When she returned later I had already contacted a vet in Vestal that had an after shot to “undo” the effects if, indeed, she had mated while away gallivanting. I took that naughty little lustful dog down to the vet’s office, and, Wendy had the injection; I brought her back, and that evening, while tied out on the front lawn, I caught her and a boyfriend going at it. Ashamed to call the vet again, I just hoped that the hormone injection she previously had would take care of that later encounter. Unfortunately, although Wendy went back to rabbit chasing to the degree that she should have been skin and bones, her stomach began to swell. In time we knew when was going to have puppies. And talk about timing. We were to be on vacation when she looked like she was going to pop.

We left her in the care of the Ashes. My friend Karen Ashe ended up being midwife and helped poor Wendy through a difficult labor while we were away, and the “fruits of that labor” was one giant puppy! When we came back this puppy must have weighted over a pound at less than a week old. All the “juice” to produce a litter of pups went into this one which we dubbed, “G.P.” for Giant Puppy. That was Spring vacation. During the summer vacation we brought our G.P. up to Rhode Island to visit Mom and my new step dad Rocky. The kids wanted to keep the pup, and I was curious as to how big he was going to become, but my new stepfather, Rocky adopted B.P. and renamed her Queenie.

We were sure that Queenie was going to become as big as a Newfoundland, but she only grew as large as Wendy. Rocky already had a dog named Tighe, a long lanky brown and white Heinz 57 variety. Unfortunately, about a year later, shortly after Mom and Rocky moved to Belgrade, Maine, Rocky overheard someone cursing out two dogs that fit Tighe and Queenie’s description. He was describing how those dogs came through his land and killed all his ducks. This conversation was with the store owner. Rocky just left the store, went home, and when he told Mom, they realized there was nothing they could do but… load both dogs into the car, bring them to the local vet, and had them both put to sleep.

I only told my children that Queenie had died. Years later when I told them the truth they thought Grandma and Grandpa Rocky had done a terrible thing. They said, “See, we should have kept the puppy.” They wanted to keep every animal in the world that passed our way. But when a family in our own neighborhood had a pet Pekin duck that everybody loved, that followed all the kids around while they played together, they could understand and forgive Mom and Rocky, as it would be an awful thing if a dog came through and killed this lovely friendly duck.


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Chapter 33 (Animals I’ve Known and Loved, cont.)

Wendy’s Instincts Intact
Wendy’s great sense of direction was probably the reason why Barney never got lost while they chased rabbits together. As soon as August, my eldest son, was old enough to join the Cub Scouts, I was talked into being a Den Mother. I was always taking Wendy everywhere with me, and when I visited my girlfriend Joyce, I’d let Wendy out to chase rabbits in the woods around her place--and sometimes I would absent mindedly leave without her. Joyce would call me and ask if I was “missing anything.” I’d go back and pick her up.

In the same way, when I took the scouts ice skating, I took along Wendy. More than two people to deal with at any one time rattled me, let alone a den of active Cubs. When everyone piled back into the station wagon to go home, I forgot Wendy. When I realized it, and went back to the pond, she was no longer there. She had no friend-of-mines doorstep to wait on, so she was obviously lost… or so I thought. I called the police and drove around the area, windows down with cold winter air chilling us… August and the mascot, Alby, while I called out her name.

The pond was located across the valley from our house, across icy cold Choconut creek, and up the hill to route 26 where she would have to cross the highway, but I had gone the only way I could get to the other side, going a mile one way, across the creek, then a mile the other. I was sure her way of finding her way back by herself would be made more difficult by my zigzag trip. Less than an hour of panic later, when returning home, I was to see a police car coming down Bunn Hill Road, when I turned to go up. I rolled down the window and told them I was the person looking for my Springer Spaniel. The police man described her to a tee and said that this dog he had just described was sitting on the doorstep about half way up Galaxy Drive… exactly where our house was located. I guess once Wendy had realized we had packed up and left the ice pond, she must have just homed in on the direction of the house, and went straight home… safely, thank God.