My Dog Story

I was lucky to have had a privileged childhood.  I had good parents, I was given great experiences, I was able to participate in whatever activities interested me, and usually I had most of the possessions that were important to a kid of my generation.  But despite how fortunate I was, there was always one thing that was missing.  I never had a dog.  For whatever reason, my parents drew the line at getting a dog and I went through childhood having to play with other people’s dogs.

Years later, in 1994, I stumbled across a lost puppy on the Kettle Valley railway trail above Kelowna.  I happily claimed the puppy as my own, at least until the rightful owners claimed her back (about 2 minutes after I found her).  But that small taste of dog ownership hooked me and I convinced my wife that it was time to get a dog.  A quick look in the classified section of the Vernon Morning Star indicated that there was a litter of flat coated retriever puppies available in Lumby.  We knew nothing about flat coated retrievers, but we phoned the breeder and were quickly convinced that this was a great dog to own.  She told us that they are a beautiful jet black retriever without the heavy undercoat of a golden, that they are light shedders, and that they have a lively, happy, and friendly personality.  A quick visit to the breeder’s farm and we were goners.

Bonnie-Rae and I will never forget the look of those puppies jumping up to greet us with front paws hanging over the kennel wall, tails wagging and tongues hanging out.  Two weeks later, when the puppies were 10 weeks old, we chose our female.  When we got her home, we took her for our first walk down to the shore of Kalamalka Lake.  While we were there she jumped up onto a dock and surprised herself by walking right off the end of a dock.  After being submerged for a brief moment, instinct kicked in and she immediately began swimming.  This was the start of a love affair with water and we decided right then and there to call her Kali, short for Kalamalka.

Kali turned out to be a wonderful dog.  She was everything that the breeder had described and more.  The flat coated retriever is a happy and active breed that makes for a great outdoor companion and affectionate family pet.  They don’t bark much and they are as friendly as can be.  If you are looking for a guard dog, don’t choose a flat coat, unless of course you want any intruders to be happily greeted by a tail wagging dog.

Kali loved swimming.  While we lived in Vernon I used to take her down to Rattlesnake Point every night where she would swim and retrieve sticks to her heart’s content.  Right through the winter, as long as the lake wasn’t frozen she would continue to swim.  When we moved to North Bay, our home on Trout Lake was pure dog heaven.  Kali ran free and spent hour after hour in the lake, pouncing at whatever it was that she would stare at in the water.  When I went for a swim, she would join me.  When we went paddling, she would join us, swimming alongside our canoe until we would have to take her back to the shore for fear of exhausting herself.

Like all dog owners, I have no shortage of stories that I can tell.  But one that is worth sharing is the time that Bonnie-Rae and I took Kali down to the pet beach in Kalamalka Lake Provincial Park one hot summer day.  There was another young couple down there who were wading knee deep in the water as their dog swam.  The fellow had shorts and no shirt and the young lady was wearing a sun dress which she was holding up on her thighs.  She was quite attractive and I must admit that my concentration wasn’t totally where it should have been.  After a few minutes of wading around, the young fellow took a dive into the water and was coaxing his girlfriend to join him.  It wasn’t quite that simple for her.  She had a sun dress to contend with, and there were strangers on the beach.  Regardless of this, I could see the temptation in her eyes and imagine that her thought process went something as follows; “that guy is with his wife, my bra and panties are no different than a bikini, and it is too nice not to swim”.  Next thing I know, the young lady was slipping the sundress up over her head and off it came.  She promptly scrunched it up in a ball and threw it towards the beach.  At that moment, Kali spotted the flying dress and decided that it was play time.  Before that sundress even hit the beach, Kali caught it and ran off into the bush.  The young lady was left standing in the water in bra and panties, watching as her sundress disappeared into the woods in the mouth of our dog.  As she turned to look at me, all I could do was shrug my shoulders and say “I trained her to do that”.

We had nine wonderful years with Kali.  She was healthy and active right until the end when cancer wasted her away in the course of five short weeks.  On December 22, 2003, just before Christmas, we had to put her down.  For all those people who have gone through that experience, you will identify with our feeling of sadness and loss in the weeks to follow.  I will always be grateful to our neighbour Chris who went out to our back lot and dug a grave through the snow and frozen earth while we were gone at the vets.  When we returned, Chris was there waiting for us and we gently placed Kali down into her final resting place, not too far from the shore of Trout
Lake.  After a simple little ceremony, Chris and Mary invited us over for lunch, knowing that some comfort and good friendship would be appreciated on that particular day.  

After losing a dog, life goes on and things gradually return to normal.  Soon you are left with all of the great memories.  We’ve got another dog now, another flat coat.  Although Tara is much different than Kali, she is every bit as great a dog, and by the way, she loves swimming in the Fraser River!