Two of my sisters (my youngest sister either wasn't born yet or she was a baby), two of my cousins and my Mum's old girlhood dog, Floss. It is the Waverley steamer sailing down the River Clyde in the background.
My older sister Moira got married and moved to
Edinburgh. I, as a teenager, worked for
one of the national bus companies at the time in Edinburgh. I used to speak to the people in our London
depot and as it happened, their dog had pups they were trying to find homes
for, enter my sister Moira and her husband James. A little border collie pup ended up in a
large cardboard box beside the driver on the London-Edinburgh Express and
Tinker as she was subsequently called entered all our lives. My sister also got a cat, Sukie, and I as a
teenager going out occasionally on a Saturday night in Edinburgh stayed the
night with my sister, the dog would sleep at my side and the cat would sleep on
my chest.
My oldest son, Christopher, could only have been about
2 or 3 when we had an unexpected caller at our house. I was at work when my wife phoned, there was
a cat at the front door, and it looked like a stray. I had a brilliant idea and said to her to put
some milk in a saucer outside the front door so Christopher can watch the cat
drink it. My wife opened the door and
put the milk outside then she phoned me to tell me that the cat had ran inside,
ran up the stairs and dived under a bed.
He became known as Skippy to all. He was about 2-3years old and had been
in a few scraps according to the vet when we got him checked. I was still not fully comfortable with cats
and my wife was totally uncomfortable with cats, period! But he was a great cat
and had tremendous patience with our sons as they grew up, however once they
got to an age where Skippy thought they should know better, he let them know in
no uncertain terms that enough was enough if they went too far. We had him for about 14 great years when his
old body started giving out; he was buried in the back garden under our apple
tree. The previous owner of our property
had their cat buried down there to somewhere.
Over the years we had a few strays at our door
including dogs too. The funniest story and it is sad and funny at the same time
is about me and cats. It happened on a night when I borrowed my wife’s car to
go to my Karate club where I coached. Christopher was about 7 and he came with
me. My car, a Volvo was being serviced
by one of my neighbours. The story
really started a few weeks before when we thought we had a gas leak. We could always smell what we thought was gas
in our driveway. The gas board checked
everything and said there was no leak, enter my karate night. We had finished training, it was dark outside
as we were heading back home, still wearing our Karate suits, when a cat must
have saw me in the car coming around a bend and then promptly jumped in the air
in front of the car and subsequently was hit.
Christopher and I got out checking the poor thing; it was obvious it was
going to die so I gently and as carefully as I could moved it to the side of
the road before returning home. I
cautioned Christopher not to tell his Mum about the cat as I would tell
her. We parked in the driveway;
Christopher left the car like a rocket shouting, Mum! Mum! Dad killed a cat, he
shouted for all the world to hear, (as if I had purposely got a gun and shot
it). My wife came to the door and
pointed to a white bag sitting outside on the doorstep,
“You’ll never guess what is in there?” she asked,
I shook my head stumped. She told me when Stewart our mechanic was
working on the car he had to feel about under the engine and discovered a damp
bundle, which turned out to be a dead cat.
The cat must have climbed under the engine when it was warm, either when
I or the previous owner had it. When the
engine was started the cat died. So, we finally found out what the gassy smell
was in our driveway.
This was 9.30 now on a dark, windy Thursday night; my
first priority was to phone the police regarding the cat I had hit with the car
in case there was some family wondering what happened to their cat. The next priority was to bury the poor cat in
the bag which must have been a bizarre scene for any onlooker, seeing this
figure in the dark, clothed in white (my karate suit) wielding a shovel and
digging a hole in my bag garden with the intention of burying something, who
knows what thoughts would have passed through their minds?
I loved our cat, Skippy, however it was a dog I always
wanted and anytime the subject came up it was rejected as not practical. Anyway,
during a weak moment on my wife’s part, I seized the opportunity of calling the
guide dogs as I had heard it was possible to obtain either a young dog that had
been rejected from training or a retired dog.
After a bit of to-ing and fro-ing we received an interview to make sure we
were suitable candidates, plus your home gets checked to ensure its
suitability. I was well warned at the
time that it took a long time, as it happened, I got a call several months
later to say they had a young Alsatian called Boston who had failed his
training and was I interested. Of
course, I said, beside myself with excitement and anticipation, I was told the
reason it had failed its training was because it was sometimes nervous. My wife and I discussed it; I would have gone
for the dog that night; however, reason prevailed with Boston being a nervous
dog, as we had our young sons, and lots of children nearby. I phoned the Guide Dogs and said no, feeling
that I would never get the chance again.
Much to my surprise I received another phone call a few months later,
they had a cross lab\retriever, Duke who was being retired early at 4yrs 10
months as he had a breathing problem. My
wife and our youngest son Colin who was off school that day came with us to the
Guide Dogs HQ at Forfar, we hadn’t told our other two sons, thinking it would
be a great surprise if we took Duke.
Well after a one and half hour drive, we arrived and were introduced to
this very large dog that just looked at you with these large soulful brown eyes
and it was love at first sight. We met
Boston too; he was still there, a beautiful dog but definitely not for us.
When you receive a guide dog you sign a contract as
you never own the dog you are only fostering.
The organisation makes regular checks to make sure their dog is being
well looked after. We were also given
instructions regarding feeding him as he was prone to overeating (definitely my
dog). We got this large dog with its large lolling pink tongue and wagging tail
in the back with Colin and we set off back home. It had been raining slightly so there was a
distinct smell of damp dog permeating the air but there was also the most
pleasant feeling of knowing you had just received a great companion.
We arrived home where my middle son Alastair thought
Christmas had come early and shared our excitement. We took Duke a quick walk to the “field”
keeping him on his lead until he got settled. My oldest son had been out with
his friends drinking, coming home about 9pm to discover we had Duke. There was nothing for it but that he and his
friends took Duke out a walk which caused great amusement when he returned home
saying “He’s not much of a guide dog, I closed my eyes and he let me walk into
a lamppost!” Of course, Duke was just
wearing a simple lead and collar not his working “gear”. As any parent knows
any pet gets amazing care to start with, Duke must have had sore paws with the
amount of walking he got from the boys but that faded soon enough, they still
took him out, but they now had to be asked.
I thought too as a fair-weather and early morning jogger the dog would
keep me company, I soon gave up on that notion as he was definitely not a runner,
I had to keep stopping and jogging backwards to help him keep up. Eventually I went my jog on my own then came
back and took him out with my legs that were tired and felt like jelly. Duke had a breathing problem which is why we
got him however it was never evident with us.
I believe it was to do with his previous work where he was with his
second blind person. This blind lady had
a blind partner too and I think his guide dog was more aggressive causing the
nervous, breathing condition that Duke had suffered from. He also had the problem common too with his
breed, hip displacement which became more prevalent as got older or put on
weight. I spoke to his previous owner to
let him know how he was. Much to my
surprise she asked if he was still eating pants and socks, I said not as far as
I was aware of, well within a couple of days what did he pass but a sock! He would eat anything, even bark off
trees. As a consequence, he was always
on a diet with the occasional treat.
Guide Dogs gave us a tag for his collar, ‘do not feed this dog’, it made
not one bit of difference, he only had to look at someone eating anywhere, and
he was guaranteed a snack. One winter
morning a knock came to our front door, it was a neighbour, she too had a
dog. She let me know that when Duke was
in our back garden he was known to skip out to her back garden and eat the lard
coated bread that she put out for the birds most mornings then, as if that
wasn’t enough, he would enter her back door and coolly eat her dog’s food. It
didn’t take long for Duke to be well known our village, all the children knew
him and always came up to clap him.
It is for me a very satisfying experience walking a
dog, for walking purely for the sake of walking is never the same. My favourite time of year walking Duke was
Spring time, we used to walk up the Bing (a man made hill from shale mining) in
East Calder, sometimes seeing the occasional deer, enjoying the beautiful
colours of the budding flowers as the bees had their pollen fill. There is a great view of the Livingston area
from the top and as you continued the walk you could look down at the burn
flowing as it was in a ravine, what made it truly different for me was looking
down at the birds flying. Duke and I
would finish our walk off sometimes by walking down to where the burn was
accessible. It was there he loved to go for a swim even when I tried to stop
him, he just got smart and always ran well in front to make sure I didn’t get
in the way. What made it worse was when
he came out and rolled on the gravely bank to dry himself. I then had to
encourage him to go back into the water (not that he took much encouraging) to
get clean and try and catch him as he came out before he got the chance to roll
in the gravel, of course all of this without getting soaked myself.
We had a health scare with him after we had had him a
couple of years. He had an eight-and-a-half-pound
tumour in his stomach which was non-malignant, the vet said he had never
removed one so large. That was Duke’s
quickest and largest weight loss, but I wouldn’t recommend it. Sadly, we had to
get him put to sleep not long before his tenth birthday, he had a major bladder
problem which could not be fixed. Life
was so strange and for a while lonely without him.
A few years later not long before my wife and I
separated we got another cat, Angel. She
was nearly what you could call a rescue cat, very independent and made the vet
very cautious when she got her injections. When living in Tenerife I had a
Canarian black cat chosen by my partner and her son, my stepson, Ethan. When considering a name, the first name I
came out with was Sooty! Would you believe it after all the scares I had with
the cat of that name, however we finally decided on Smokey.
When we got Smokey he fitted in the palm of my hand,
he was a very clever cat, most of the time.
We lived in a second-floor apartment with a great balcony overlooking
the glistening blue sea and magnificent sunsets. We’d had Smokey for a few months and one
morning Ethan and I were going to have our breakfast but before we did, we
discovered the cat was missing. We
checked all the cupboards, under beds, everywhere as cats are very good at
hiding. We couldn’t find him anywhere; I
came out to the balcony where he liked to laze, checking under the sun beds but
there was no sign of him anywhere. Ethan and I looked over the balcony and I
whistled in the off chance he would hear me.
Sure, enough we heard a faint meow.
We still couldn’t see him anywhere, so I tried again and there was the
meow. I was sure the sound was coming
from the other side of the complex, eventually I looked down to the balcony
immediately below us to see this pathetic wee bundle staring up at me, he must
have fallen down through the small pillars around our balcony. Fortunately, he appeared to be okay however
it was 8 o’clock, Saturday morning and it was too early to disturb my
neighbours. I tried dangling a sheet from my balcony, then I walked below the
balcony he was on trying to get him to somewhere I could reach him all to no
avail. So, at 8.30 I presented myself at
my downstairs neighbour’s door to discover she was awake (of course she would
have to be totally deaf not to have heard the meows, the whistles and the
spoken encouragement) and she too had been trying to help the cat who would
have none of it. He was very glad to see
me.
