In this story, my friend, Barbara, and I were in our forties. Barbara’s household consisted of herself, her husband (my childhood friend, but that’s a story for another time),two five-year old boys and three large, hairy, breed-non-specific dogs She was eight months pregnant at the time. Myself I had husband, two girls: six and two years old, and one miniature dachshund. On this day our family was visiting Barbara’s family on the farm where they lived. My husband and Barbara’s husband went to do some hardware shopping (gardening tools and saw blades, not computers), and Barbara and I stayed back on the farm with the rest of the aforementioned life forms.
During spring and early summer the farm had a pond fed by melting snow. Later in the summer it used to dry up, but this story happened in March. The pond, at its highest at this time of year, was about three or four feet deep that day (although at the beginning of the story I didn’t know the depth) and about thirty feet in diameter.
So, there we all were, mothers, children and dogs, playing happily outside on a Saturday afternoon in March. The weather in that part of Quebec is still chilly in March, sometimes downright cold. Today was between chilly and cold; you didn’t want to be out without a jacket. And water had melted very recently. Perhaps yesterday?
Not all of our charges were in the mothers’ line of view at all times. Dogs and boys tended to run off to other parts of the farm from time to time. The dogs with permission, the boys without, but they would run off anyway.
Barbara’s sons, who had been off somewhere, came running to us mothers screaming, “Keena’s in trouble!” Keena was one of Barbara’s large dogs. Shehad thick, bushy, off-white hair. This was Keena. Barbara’s hair is not relevant to these proceedings. The boys ran off again, leading the way to the pond where we all saw Keena, smack dab in the middle. She was paddling madly and had a stick in her mouth. During all the things that happened (as I will relate), she never let go of the stick.
Upon seeing this, my kids joined in the screaming and all children jumped up and down. Meanwhile the three dogs raced around the outline of the pond. In the midst of all this activity, Barbara and I tried to evaluate the situation. Something was definitely odd. Keena was paddling away, apparently trying to swim her way out of the pond, but she never left her spot in the middle of the pond.
Our adult logic told Barbara and me that Keena must be stuck on something below the surface of the water. She needed rescue. Who would go investigate and free her? Not very pregnant Barbara. Not the children, because they were, after all, small children. Nor any of the dogs because they lacked opposable thumbs.
So it was I, all of five feet tall, that bravely volunteered to go. As though I had a choice. Did I mention the pond was filled with spring run-off? Did I also mention that at the time the decision was made nobody knew the actual depth of the pond? None of that matters when a dog needs help.
Within the background of small creatures screaming, jumping, running, and by now, barking, I shed my jacket (fearing it might weigh me down) and stepped, resolute and shivering, into the pond and put one slow careful foot in front of the other, hoping not to hit water higher than I was. While I was doing this, my own kids began howling. Screams of “Mummy! Mummy!” rose in the air as the girls set off running around the outskirts of the pond with the dogs.
Well, wasn’t I the center of attention now.Barbara’s boys wereurging me to go faster and Barbara was urging me to be careful. The dogs ran faster and faster around the perimeter. Barbara further called out to me to ask what she could do. My chattering teeth made my grumbles sound pretty funny as I muttered to myself: you’re eight months pregnant, what do you think you can do? Actually she did have an important function, keeping an eye of the various creatures in attendance.
At length I reached Keena in the middle of the pond. I was about chest high in cold water. At times of crisis you can sometimes tune out the temperature. I figured Keena’s collar must have been grabbed by something – perhaps a submerged stick or piece of fencing wire. I felt all around Keena’s neck and found nothing there. Meanwhile, of course, Barbara and the kids kept calling out to know what I had found.
I was puzzled. I began feeling all around the dog – a very large one – for some clue as to what was stopping her from swimming away. I started feeling the cold water again, too. Keena must have been tiring, her paddles were slowing down. However she never let go that stick in her mouth.
Finally I felt something very fine and metallic attached to Keena’s side. Far under the water, of course. I followed it with my hands, and ended up blessing the Deity that I hadn’t had to duck under the water. I found a piece of fencing wire that had tangled in Keena’s long, unrulyhair.
So, just untangle it, right? Not quite that easy, I had to stand several more minutes trying to separate metal from dog hair. Finally Keena was free and paddled shoreward, stick still firmly in her mouth. I never did see when or where she dropped it. I was making a bee-line to the farmhouse, my own kids and dachshund trotting along behind. Barbara’s sons and dogs, including the rescued one, promptly lost interest.
Inside, my kids ascertained that I wasn’t going to die and leave them with only Daddy to raise them. My dog noted that we were in the kitchen, so something edible might follow. He realized he was wrong. So my three went to the living room and found something with which to amuse themselves. Barbara went to find me something dry to wear and a blanket in which to huddle. Then she headed back outside to round up her own kids and dogs.
And that is how my husband found me about twenty minutes later when he and Barbara’s husband came back from shopping. I was sitting in the farmhouse kitchen, in clothes not my own and swaddled up. Naturally he demanded an explanation for such untoward behaviour, as was his wont when he felt I should be criticized for something. But that’s a story for another time.
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from Pets https://www.reddit.com/r/Pets/comments/dhblhz/saving_keena/
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