Walking Forward, Looking Back

by Dinah Latham

  The strange thing is that as the day moves on, even this level of familiarity amongst the owners seems to wane and it can become something of a challenge to engage in even dog talk on the street, let alone chat.

  And then, of course, there are the joggers and runners, most with a mutt of some description in tow somewhere. I always feel a bit sorry for these dogs because it is most probably their only walk of the day and what about all that sniffing and stopping and peeing on certain tufts of grass to let your friend know you’ve just passed by? Surely every dog owner knows that this is just so important to every hound. How do you manage to fit that in if you’re attached by a lead to a man who appears to be running for his life, puffing and blowing the whole way with a special water bottle in his other hand, arms pumping backwards and forwards like pistons? Even when he’s only jogging, rather than really running, it’s a struggle. Harriet and I wander rather aimlessly along while the black Lab over the road looks across longingly at us as if saying, “Hiya! Sorry can’t stop; we’ve got another four miles to go at this pace before he goes to work… bye!”

  * * *

  Quite late in my career, at fifty-four years of age, I became a lecturer at The Royal Marsden, which necessitated awful commutes into London on the early morning train. Commuting by train is a whole new world!

  A deafening silence descends, except for the odd mobile phone call. All travellers should be congratulated on their ability to avert their gaze, regardless of the havoc taking place.

  I had a nosebleed on one such journey and was trying to retrieve a packet of tissues from my briefcase with one hand, while managing, with considerable difficulty, to stem the flow with the napkin from around my paper coffee cup. All newspapers were lifted a little higher while various members coughed and fidgeted, trying to pretend they hadn’t noticed. I was so tempted to reach out and grab one of the displayed white handkerchiefs in those ‘oh so neat’ top suit pockets but I feared it might make the front page of tomorrow’s newspaper to be so brazen. The same people travelling on the same train, day in day out; why does no-one speak? What a huge missed chance to interact with others; great conversations and friendships. When John Donne said ‘No man is an island’ he had obviously never travelled on an early morning commuter train.

  I smile now as I muse on the wide variety of human relationships we all do and do not develop in our lifetimes… particularly those relationships with patients; some close and some simply professional.

  * * *

  Harriet bounces back from the undergrowth to jump up and leave two muddy paw marks on my tracksuit. It’s as if she’s reminding me of my relationship with her.

  * * *

  The relationship between a dog and a human is always complicated. The two know each other in a way no-one else quite understands; a connection shrouded in personal history, temperament, experience, instinct and love.

  This sense of deep companionship between owner and faithful hound can be strange to explain; a relationship that doesn’t depend on the dog’s qualities or merit but rather on some bizarre and subtle coming together of like-minded spirits. Maybe it is this ‘spiritual knowing’ aspect that is the essence of the value held between us and yet, while I hold fast to this satisfying feeling of partnership, I know that I don’t readily acknowledge its depth to others. This may be because the profundity of the relationship between man and beast also carries with it a level of embarrassment, since we dog-owners know deep down that the sense of adulation is not only one way, not only from him to you, but that you’re definitely an equal party in this mutual admiration society.

  I read the strapline on a card I couldn’t resist buying recently, which had a picture of a quite ordinary dog on the front. The dog was staring up adoringly at his owner. Written underneath was:

  ‘Do not accept your dog’s admiration as conclusive evidence that you are wonderful.’

  Why not, I say; it feels okay to me. I might paste it onto my fridge to remind myself of how wonderful she thinks I am!

  * * *

  The last couple of weeks in January seem unending this year. The winter landscape is drained of colour. The woodland seems lifeless and the trees stand bare; their skeletal silhouettes stark against the dull grey skyline. Harriet enjoys drinking from the many tree roots harbouring the results of a night of heavy rainfall but it’s just a steady drizzle now, and over the last few weeks I’ve learned to be grateful for such small mercies. Last year the hazelnut catkins had begun to show by late January. Today I see no sign of any. The mud continues to deepen and I choose to stick to the main bridleway, rather than go off track up over the field. It’s just too sticky to get a firm foothold and galloping full tilt and sliding to a standstill, spraying mud in all directions, is a talent Harriet has perfected but I have yet to learn.

  We come to the fallen tree obstructing part of the bridleway. It’s been there some time now and a pathway has developed around it with moss and toadstools taking hold along its length. The rain has found and formed a riverbed of its own around the rotting trunk, taking leaf debris on down the hill. The extent of the rain is quite altering the trail terrain; the rivulet carving its path all the way down and under the railway bridge at the far end.

  Even Harriet seems fed up with the unremitting rain. It seems to have gone on forever, adding another chapter to each and every walk. When we get home, there’s my dirty boots and her muddy paws, all the way up to and including her underbelly. It’s like an extra workout getting her clean and then making sure she doesn’t decide to dry herself by rolling on my bed.

  She always looks so dejected when she’s wet and I’m musing about how similar her expression is then to Deborah’s now as we meet on the common. Max, her black Scottie dog, sits quietly by her side looking depressed while Harriet finds a particularly large, muddy puddle under the park bench and begins to splash about and dig. Deborah doesn’t really like Harriet. She looks at her disapprovingly and always backs away, wary that she might jump up. Deborah doesn’t wear dog-walking clothes like the rest of us. She’s always got matching gear on: leather gloves and swanky leather boots; not for her tracksuit trousers and a fleece with dog treats in the pocket but rather a smart jacket with a fur collar, and always an immaculate hair-do. She begins to drone on about her longing for grandchildren and her daughter’s refusal to oblige. I try to make sympathetic noises but I’m aware that they don’t sound too sincere. It seems to be a necessary accompaniment that develops in the newly retired and it’s one I neither understand nor share. The strange thing is that many of these wannabe grannies seem to have missed the delights of their own children as preschoolers, busy being the emancipated women who have it all, career and model mum. Could they now be hankering for what they missed?

  Deborah then begins to bleat about the fact that they’ve had to postpone their ‘little break’ in Cyprus because of her husband’s work – important city gent, I’m not sure what he does exactly, and possibly neither does Deborah, but of course he’s far too critical for them to manage without just now and she so needed that little break. It’s over three months since they got back from skiing in St Moritz.

  * * *

  Perhaps it’s just me who’s missing the ‘longing to travel’ gene. If you’re on your own and retired, it seems everyone thinks you’re desperate to stand in Tiananmen Square or to cross the San Francisco Bridge. When Harriet and I holiday, we head for Cornwall with its indeterminate weather, coastal walks, beaches with sand dunes and fantastic cream teas.

  * * *

  It begins to drizzle quite heavily and Deborah of course has her umbrella, but now takes her plastic rain hat out of her pocket as well. She then dictates that I must take Harriet home and bathe her. I have a really nasty thought running through my head; I want to tell her to take miserable Max home and maybe put him down and get a more cheerful dog… but I don’t. In reality, I stoop and ruffle the fur on Max’s head and silently tell him to cheer up as I give him one of Harriet’s favourite treats from my
pocket when Deborah isn’t looking. Max is on a very special vegetarian dog food and is not allowed any ‘extras’ I’ve been told.

  As Harriet and I head for home, I look down at myself and realise just how shabby my dog walking clothes are and, yes, I too will need a bath.

  * * *

  How glad I am to be living with only Harriet. A woman doesn’t have to worry about looking her best to impress a dog: no make-up, tousled hair, scruffy shoes; she doesn’t care. Harriet knows I’m beautiful because I have a ball in my pocket.

  9

  MY NEW PASSION IN LIFE

  I pull into the field and leave the engine running while I close the farm gate. I then jump back into the car and head down to the far end of the field to park up where there is shade under a mulberry tree that is just coming into fruit. Harriet tramples back and forth across the back seat, whining with excitement and putting her front paws up on the inside door handle and poking her head impatiently out of the half open window on either side in turn, looking, looking again; where are the sheep?

  * * *

  We have together found a new passion in life: sheepherding. Neither of us is brilliant yet but we share an eagerness in the craft that must surely yield results in time through sheer determination. I recall my excitement as I woke this morning to find it was a sheepherding day – like a child who remembers today is his birthday!

  * * *

  Pam waves from the other field and I wave back, trying to look vaguely more controlled than Harriet. Gordon shouts, “G’morning,” as he disappears driving the truck with the hay bales through to the far field. Between them, they run their small sheep farm and, alongside the work that entails, they allow novices like me access to their sheep; helping both the dogs and their owners.

  * * *

  I can’t quite believe the fascination, the wonder, the desire to learn more, and just the sheer joy that I have found in this newest pastime. To watch a sheepdog learn to gather a flock of sheep, execute the lift, and fetch them back down the field is like watching a talented musician extract incredibly beautiful sounds from his instrument.

  At our first lesson with Pam, Harriet was backing off on to the pen railings as the sheep did their best to frighten her – turning and stamping their feet at her while they tried to knock me over in the mud – and the rain poured down. I remember thinking that if I could enjoy this now, it held something special. It did too. We moved on to the glorious spring weather, with its lambing, its learning and its laughter.

  Friendships have grown with other Collie dog owners learning to herd. They have your true Border Collies – the ones seen on One Man and his Dog – so Harriet with her long shaggy coat doesn’t quite fit the image. But Beardies were used for herding in the past. Harriet grew in confidence, became excited about herding and I began to learn not only about sheepherding but also about sheep.

  I’m filled with wonder at what Harriet is capable of doing even now, and it’s so rewarding training her and watching her develop. I’ve allowed myself to believe that if I can train her to go to the end of a large field and bring a hefty herd of sheep to me, maybe even with whistle commands, it will be one of the great achievements of my lifetime. We haven’t reached the dizzy heights of the whistle yet; we’re working with our ‘comebye’, ‘aaway’ flanks, and our ‘walk on’ verbal directives for now.

  And above it all it is profoundly pleasurable to find that, in retirement, there is something that sets me alight with a new dream, especially when it had never registered on the radar of ‘things I want to do’. There are, inevitably, interests developed when you give up work that you’ve waited years to have time to do and that’s great, but this is something different: a world about which you had no notion reaches out and grabs you, forcing you to take notice and to respond to its lure.

  Sadly, what usually runs right alongside beginning these long-awaited leisure pursuits is a huge frustration at not having somehow tackled each and every one of them earlier. Maybe I would have discovered some hidden, previously unexposed, talent that I would have been able to reveal to the world… yes, well, don’t let’s get carried away.

  At times now it flashes through my head that maybe I chose the wrong career and should have gone into sheep farming instead. I’m not sure it’s a really serious thought and maybe it’s just a desire for another ‘crack of the whip’ or perhaps, more pertinently, to have another chance to get it right. But the thing we don’t have by the time we reach retirement is the time to try too many different things and get them wrong… well, big things anyway. The young have the advantage of all those years ahead when any bad choices can either be turned around or at least discounted by the good choices made later; when mistakes can be followed by victories. Perhaps as we get older we are just less willing to take chances. Maybe we become somewhat risk-averse while the young have a more ‘gung ho’ attitude still going on for them.

  I feel sure we all have an unclimbed mountain within us waiting for us to plant our own Union Jack on its peak. I’m not sure I’ll ever stand at that post, crook in hand, with Harriet translating my every whistle like a linguist and penning her sheep like a winner, but I do know that sheepherding and trialling is rapidly becoming my unclimbed peak!

  * * *

  We walk over to the enclosure where six sheep cluster together awaiting their fate. Harriet, with great effort, manages to restrain herself and stays close by my side with pertinent reminders from me at regular intervals. She’s crouched close to the ground at every step; head forward and low, eyes directly on the sheep, tail down, one front paw hovering above land in typical sheepdog pose. This stealthy stance is repeated with every step until we reach the gate. The pen is large, about thirty feet across, and I direct Harriet to lie down outside the gate while I open it and step inside before allowing her to join me, again with the instruction to lie down. She must wait to be invited to the sheep by me. We start working together, with Pam leaning on the gate shouting instructions:.

  “Back out… back out. Keep her back from the sheep. Don’t let her circle the sheep like that! Lie her down…. now, walk on. Let her balance the sheep! Keep going… let her work! That’s better.”

  So we’re not quite poetry in motion yet!

  We work on, Harriet and I, both trying hard to get it right. It’s a hot day and the sheep need a rest. I instruct her to lie down once more and go towards her with a “That’ll do,” accompanying the slap on my thigh as I take her away from the sheep. I continue to exhort her to stay at my side as we head towards the enclosure gate with a further “That’ll do!” in an attempt to dissuade her from darting back to the sheep. This time she reluctantly submits, her ears go back and we leave the ring to words of encouragement from Pam to both of us. In reply, Harriet streaks off to the old green bath in the corner of the field, half full of rainwater, and leaps in congratulating herself on her achievements. I fight to get my breath back and kid myself that the red cheeks are merely a glowing response to the faint praise delivered by Pam. I sink into one of the plastic garden chairs in the barn, where I satiate my thirst with coffee from Pam’s flask. Never has anything tasted so good. I recount our progress to Gordon, as a dripping Harriet joins us for half my biscuit. The sheep shelter in the shade, discussing how to get the better of that ragged little dog who gets a bit big for her boots… “And she’s not even a proper Collie… and her owner doesn’t seem really to have got the hang of it either… Hey you over there; see if you can trip her up good and proper next time.”

  * * *

  I smile to myself as I imagine Deborah’s face if I asked her if she’d like to join me! I wonder what other leisure activity I have undertaken in my life that has been so physically exhausting. I suppose sheepherding would be called a sport and obviously when carried out at One Man and his Dog level it isn’t as physically active… well, not for the man anyway; yes for the dog. Indeed, I remember listening to one of the country’s top competitors talking about how sheepdog trialling was one of the few ac
tivities where age was no barrier; where his experience in his sixties was a bonus and his lack of physical prowess was not a disadvantage. Well, all I can say is, it’s bloomin’ physical right now. I can’t quite believe I’m taking part in physical activity that I’m actually enjoying, having been so useless at sport all my life. I smile again as I imagine Pam saying, ‘No change there then!’ She clearly doesn’t see me as a natural. Harriet seems to get her approval but I’m obviously seen as a non-sports person!

  I learned a fear of sport at school with the humiliation of never being picked for any team until I was the only one left and some unlucky side was forced to add me to their squad, and where the ever-popular team captain struggled to place me where I would cause least harm. Memories flooded back of extremely keen pupils who behaved as though their lives depended upon winning the hockey game and who seemed to revel in running up and down in the freezing cold (in navy knickers) bashing anything that came within range of their hockey sticks. Far too frequently it seemed it was my ankles that took the force of the blows, until I learnt to hit that blasted ball to them as they thundered towards me, much to the chagrin of my own team members. I wasn’t even very good at that since our school did not own such a thing as a left-handed hockey stick. Apparently I was meant to claim the ball, dash away from the marauding crowd and ‘pass’ it to some wing member of my team who was standing on the side-lines screaming, “To me! To me!” in true St. Trinian’s fashion!

  I gazed in amazement as class members flew over the ‘horse’ and the ‘box’ in the gym, my legs turning to jelly as some hefty mistress took delight in ridiculing any attempt I made to take part. I still shiver when I remember the hideousness of it.

  So ingrained is the degradation of it all that my children soon learned that, while you had to be close to moribund to get a day off school, Mum was a ‘soft touch’ when it came to getting a letter to release you from PE (physical education).