09/01/2025
Today marks one year since Archie’s passing and as he has been on my mind a lot lately, I found myself looking at his puppy photos. It took me back to that time when our doggie/guardian relationship was in its infancy. I was reminded of some of the ‘adventures’ Archie embarked upon, and I was not always a willing participant. You could call me the unwitting ‘side kick’. One such adventure that immediately springs to mind had me in stitches on recollection. This was very quickly replaced with a wave of utter horror when I remember the feeling I felt at the time and how things could have turned out so differently. I thought I would share this occasion with you.
Before I do though, please keep in mind that back then, it’ll be eighteen years now, my life looked very different to how it does today and way before I started down my current career path. This tail (spelling intended) may well resonate with those among the AllAbouttheHound community who don’t have a dog behavioural background. Ignorance is bliss, as they say!
Let’s call this story ‘Archie’s Outing at Day’s Lock’.
As many of you know, I lived in the UK for a while. I lived in Oxfordshire, which I personally think is a very beautiful part of the UK. It is very close to wide, open spaces and not too far from the Cotswolds. In the UK, you are not as restricted about where you can take your dogs as you are in New Zealand, so you are spoiled with lots of choices.
I lived very close to Day’s Lock. This Lock is on the river Thames (which starts in the Cotswolds I think and travels the length of the country into the centre of London and onward into the North Sea). Archie was about 10 months old at the time and I decided to take him down to Day’s Lock and along the river Thames. There was lots of countryside we could wander too. It was late winter, early spring so still a bit cold. I remember being wrapped up, feeling nice and cosy for our outing. The day before, there had been a horrendous storm, torrential rain, howling winds, thunder and lightning etc., so the river was high and raging. Having complete trust in my dog and giving no thought to the fact that I had done no (zero, nil, nada) recall training, I let Archie off the lead…. Yep! I did that! I mean, what could go wrong?
It started off very well indeed! Archie was frolicking along exploring the path and jumping in and out of the puddles. Then… he started to gain momentum! He started running towards the riverbank. I picked up my pace a wee bit, you know… to keep up. I didn’t feel any sense of urgency because I was thinking, “where can he go?”. I was not prepared for what happened next. At that very moment, I see my little dog launch himself off the embankment, flying high into the air, all four limbs outstretched, like a doggie ballerina, and into the river Thames. The horror!! My quickened pace turned into an Olympic qualifying sprint. I was shouting, “OH MY GOD”, “OOOOOH MYYYYYY GODDDDD”, and kept yelling his name over and over, “Archie, Archie, Archie”. I was frantic. I ran along the embankment ahead of him, even though he was travelling down river at a rather fast rate of knots. I scurried down the steep embankment, which due to the storm of the previous day was just a mass of mud. I held onto some undergrowth low down on the waterline and leaned out as far as I could. Thankfully, Archie hadn’t drifted out too far into the middle of the river and I was able to grab him as he was coming towards me. Thank God for dog harnesses! With all my might, I flung Archie back over the embankment as far as I possibly could. I then had the task of getting myself back up the bank but didn’t have anything to grab onto. I knew I had to get back to the top before Archie launched himself back into the river. Yes, that was a very real possibility! I had to dig my way up, thrusting my hands and feet alternately into the muddy river bank, crawling up as quickly as I could. Both of us were covered from head to foot in mud. Both wet, admittedly Archie was soaked to the bone. All the while I was aware of all the onlookers wondering what the commotion was about and what on earth we were doing. Archie was completely oblivious to it all and was having a wail of a time running to and from all the onlookers looking for attention. I quickly caught up to him and while he was distracted jumping up on someone (yes, he did that too, much to the disgruntlement of the person. I mean, Archie was covered from head to foot in mud so who could blame them), I managed to get the lead on Archie, apologising profusely as I did so.
If I had not managed to grab a hold of Archie when I did, I hate to imagine how that could have played out.
All privileges were revoked (much too late I might add), and we headed back to the carpark and then for home. That was more excitement than I had bargained for – no doubt! Thankfully we both survived it, albeit wet and covered in mud. That incident was par for the course in my life with this little dog. He embraced the world and lived his best life. He certainly didn’t let his size stand in his way. I guess we could all learn a lesson from that, eh?
And my lesson?
DON’T LET YOUR DOG OFF THE LEAD IF THEY HAVE NO RECALL. It was a hard lesson, for sure.
