Tucker, Abby and I

Tucker and I met when he was 2 months old.

He was the first dog I had ever had that was mine. I’ve been around dogs all my life but they were ‘family’ dogs so they belonged to all of us. They were there when we went exploring and hung out in the house with us at night. They usually stayed downstairs when we went to bed but sometimes one would come upstairs and choose someone to sleep with. I moved around a lot at night so they usually went past me and slept with one of my other sisters who didn’t move around quite so much. One of them even had puppies in my sister’s bed. What a surprise when we woke up in the morning.

Tuckers black coat looked a little dull because he still had his puppy hair on him but once that shed he was very shinny. He was curious about everything. It was all so new to him, he would trip over his own feet racing to check whatever caught his eye or nose. He and his brother Sydney slept most of the way home after picking them up. When we stopped they were eager to check out the grass and take a moment to chew on some of it.

When Tucker and I got home, he checked out the floor, the walls, the porch and anything else he could reach. I had an old cat, Samantha and the two of them would sleep together. It didn’t last long, Samantha passed away a few months after Tucker came into our life. A friend of mine had a couple of cats that her family didn’t want so I agreed to adopt both of them. One I named Butler and the other, Daisy.

When Daisy and Tucker met, it was love at first sight for Daisy, not so much for Tucker but he was such a sweet boy, he allowed her to sleep with him.

I didn’t know it at the time, but Daisy was pregnant and a few weeks later gave birth to 7 kittens. Tucker was very curious about them and Daisy had no problem letting him get close. In fact she didn’t mind when he picked them up one at a time and took them outside. I had to count them every day to make sure all of them were inside. If not, I was outside trying to find out where he put them. He never hurt them, being a black lab, he had a very soft mouth. They were wet from being in his mouth when I found them though and Daisy would clean them when I brought them back.

Tucker and I often went to the park to meet up with my sister and Sydney. The pups would play really hard.

I introduced him to the river on these walks. At first he wasn’t too sure about this stuff but it didn’t take him long to figure it all out. Soon he and Sydney were playing just as hard in the water as out of it. His favourite toy at this time was a stick, the bigger the better. He would accept the ball too but if there was a stick around, the ball could float down the river for all he cared. He would leave it up to Sydney to swim out and get it as he focused on that log he was trying to pull out of the ground.

In the winter there was a bit of a pond by my place where we would go and play. He loved sliding on the ice into the snowbank so I made sure to toss the stick in the deepest snow I could find. My black dog became snow white in no time. You could see the laughter on his face as he brought it back to me and dropped it or lifted it up so I could grab it and toss it again. The river is constantly changing and within a couple of years, that little pond disappeared, eaten up by the spring floods. It was ok though, we had plenty of places to play with or without water.

I wanted something to remember his puppy days so when he was 3 months old I sat him beside my work boots and took a picture. I did it again at 6 months and at a year.

I took hundreds of photos of my boy including him leaping off a log into the water to catch the stick.

When he was a year old, Abby came into our life.

She is a husky, shepherd and lab cross. Tucker accepted her just like he accepted Daisy and Butler (one of Daisy’s kittens from her first litter). From the start, Abby was very bossy towards Tucker and the cats. She doesn’t chase the ball unless she sees Tucker chasing it - I think she’s chasing him more than the ball. Occasionally she even slept on top of him; but now that they’re both much older, that doesn’t happen. She brought him a new experience of playing a rough and tumble game. I tried to stay out of the way when she tore through the house as fast as she could. She’s much faster than Tucker so all he can do is stand there and bark at her as she speeds by him.

She quickly adjusted to our routine of going to the park and the river for a swim in the summer and chasing the ball in the winter.

She was the best at finding the ball when it got buried in the snow. Problem was, when she found it she didn’t want to give it back. She would prance around, very proud of herself and show Tucker and Sydney that she had it. As soon as a scent grabbed her attention though, the ball was forgotten. Tucker would grab it and run back to me for it to be tossed and it all started again.

We found a new field to explore, it was wide open and had all kinds of scents for dogs to follow. There was a bit of a swamp where some water birds liked to nest and Tucker wanted to chase them. They easily evaded him, he never really got close but that didn’t stop him from trying. Also on this property was a canyon, it had very steep walls and showed signs of spring run off so we would have to avoid it in the spring. It echoed too, Tucker, Abby and Sydney would bark sometimes just to hear the ‘other’ dogs respond. It was very funny. I think they figured it out after a bit and stopped doing it. There were tracks of other dogs there as well and Abby spent her time trying to follow all of them. Tucker managed to figure out how to get up high when the ball was thrown up onto a ledge.

These excursions were fun for all of us. We were able to take the dogs to this field for a few years but eventually, it was purchased and fenced off for development. Not long after that COVID-19 hit everywhere. Then the summer came along with forest fires and we were put on alert for evacuation. No one wanted to be too far from home. We managed to get some walks in but not to the extent as before. This past year our town suffered a serious flooding. Everywhere we could go was covered in muck, not just mud but other stuff as well. We’ve all been cooped up too long. All of us are getting cabin fever.

Tucker is going to be 8 this year and Abby will be 7. They have lots of energy still but I have to admit they’re both a little chubby from a lack of exercise. I’m trying to find some place I can take them to run but there’s nothing close to home anymore. There is more traffic on the road that use to be quiet because one of the bridges was destroyed so cars and trucks have to take the road by my place. The dog park is gone as well and the school yard has been dug up for repairs. There is a lot of adjusting all of us have to do. We will get past this and at some point, Tucker, Abby and I will be able to run free again.