Not sure how to word it: “Happy Forever Home Anniversary,” perhaps.
At any rate, one year ago on Oct. 11 Becky and I welcomed our dog Luna into our home and lives. It has been a good fit for all of us.
She is a bigger dog than either of us had been used to — 75 pounds as of last week’s annual exam. Still, other than having to step around her when she finds a spot smack dab on the floor of the entryway between two rooms, or realizing I should secure my wine glass from her substantial, swinging tail as she walks by, it has been a happy merger of human and animal spirits.
We met her through a series of coincidences that I can only believe was meant to be. A friend of our neighbor Kelly had a dog in need of a home. After three years without a dog Becky and I figured it might be our time. Arrangements were made to meet Luna. Things worked out. “She is very gentle,” her former human told us. (true.) “She will take food off the counter if she is given chance.” (also true.) She is sweet, loyal and obedient. (True. True. And True.)
Also, the city-dwelling humans warned us Luna gets anxious if she is crated. For the young couple with careers requiring them to leave Luna at home for hours at a time this was a problem. Such a dog needs frequent exercise, and a quick leash walk around the block didn’t seem fair to her or always possible for their heavily scheduled lives. Well, we have several wooded acres, we explained, and not too many strictly scheduled commitments. It seemed like a solution sent from the universe.
Early on, we experienced Luna’s anxiety about being confined for too long. At first we tried to confine Luna to a room. Nope. Had we stayed away a couple of hours long, I wondered if she might have clawed and scratched through the wooded door. We tried a baby gate. She knocked it down. After we realized she wasn’t going to leave “messes” all over the house, we simply let her have the run of the place while we were gone.
This home detention strategy worked for trips that were 4 or even 5 hours long, but we were nervous about taking it much further. Neighbor Kelly suggested Luna could stay in the large fenced-in area with her outdoor dogs. Luna knew them from our daily walks. “Problem solved,” we thought. On the initial attempt, Becky and I decided to go for a wedding anniversary bike ride in Franklin. About mile three into the trail, Becky got a text from Kelly: “Luna has escaped.”
Luna was discovered lying on our front porch which is a comfort, in a way. Then Kelly locked Luna in a smaller farm pen. Kelly texted soon to report Luna had figured out how to open the latch on the gate. “Sigh. Okay, Just let her stay on the front porch until we get home,” we said.
We figured to build our own kennel so we bought 6ft kennel panels from Tractor Supply. We needed the taller panels because standard 4ft fencing wouldn’t do. We learned this when we left Luna at daughter Rachel’s house in Indianapolis while we went to dinner. As we were leaving the restaurant, Rachel noticed a post on her neighborhood group text. “Anyone recognize this dog? She showed up at our house. She’s very sweet.”
We tried the kennel at a couple of spots near the house and settled on a design that would incorporate the garage access door into the overall plan. Luna could be outside and, if need be, she could go inside. “Pretty clever,” we thought.
We did a couple of trial runs in preparation for an upcoming wedding invite that would require us being gone for hours. D-Day (Dog Day) came and we drove away around noon with Luna looking at us through the impregnable kennel fencing. But 10 hours later we turned into the driveway to see Luna running to greet our car.
One of my favorite movies as a kid was “The Great Escape.” In the film, allied POWs dig a series of tunnels to escape a Nazi prison camp. That’s how we envisioned Luna managing her Great Escape.
Well, as I like to say: you can’t go wrong with the classics.
Norman Knight, a retired Clark-Pleasant Middle School teacher, writes this weekly column for the Daily Journal. Send comments to [email protected].
