Happy, The Hero

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My wife and I live in NW Florida along a 7-mile national park called the Gulf Islands National Seashore, just across from this barrier reef island, with the Santa Rosa Sound separating us from the Gulf. I am 64 years old; I walk the shores year round and swim long distance out into the Gulf year round, with water temperatures ranging from 62 to 86 degrees. The sands, driftwood, and shifting tide pools create a “new beach” every day that I am there walking or swimming, and being a national park it has no commercial areas and few lifeguards, only in the summer months. It is the “Zen” of all beaches; changing by the minute, dangerous with rip tides and opposing currents, and as desolate in winter as one could imagine. I’ve swum with dolphins many times year round, and through schools of pompano, flounder, algae and jellyfish, in a true ecological wonder of the U.S. In August 2013, my wife and I had lost our dog Lacey, 14 years old, after bouts with cancer and even losing a leg, and then this perfectly trained black lab mutt died. To learn more about Lacey and how she taught us to live, see my article on Lacey, The Conqueror. You will see why we had decided against ever having a dog again, fearful of losing to death yet again, and not being willing to handle the pain. But in May 2014, while I was still reeling from the loss of “my Lacey” another stray dog came our way. Our daughter found him on the streets of San Antonio, Texas. About one year old, marred from being in dogfights and living on the streets, this dog had pit bull in him, a ripped ear, and was not handsome. Of course, my wife and I took him, as he was to be put down. We named him Happy, as happiness was something we both needed desperately in our lives at that time. Happy is a quintessential dog - wild, rambunctious, dirty, and almost impossible to train. Much like Lacey, Happy needed training - he needed to understand what was expected of him, and if he had to accept the proposition or not. However, while ultimately it was Lacey who trained me, with Happy it was he who needed my structure and guidance. For the past year we’ve been working to understand each other and Happy has learned to follow my commands, one step at a time. It has taken patience and time on both our parts - and is a journey we’re still on. In January 2015 Happy he was diagnosed with “Live Adult Heartworms”, it’s very dangerous and a high chance of death. We spent a lot of money, time and fear as he went through treatment. For three months he had to live quietly: no walks, no chasing balls and the opposite of who he was. That took training. We then had to wait nine months with his living a normal dog’s life, on pins and needles while the medicine either worked, or he would have died.

Happy, The Hero

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In early January 2016 he had just been given a clean bill of health and off I went to fully train him, and help him with his being wild and rambunctious. Happy and I began serious training (it takes two to train) and I spent every day for two hours walking him, “sneaking him” on the wild Gulf Island beach during the winter months of NW Florida when none are around, and truly training. Two weeks later on January 21, 2016, I left midday in blinding rain, 16 mph per hour wind gusts, 62 degrees water temperature and 58 degrees out, for a long walk with our “mutt” Happy. Off training again, and learning one another. I know, I'm nuts, I love this sort of thing, walking along the natural 7 mile stretch of national seashore in the rain. It’s been on these walks that Happy and I have been able to finally get in sync, training each other one-step at a time. Half an hour into our walk I slipped on an old rock seawall, mostly submerged in the sand and covered with algae. I fell hard. My hands were gloved, but in my fall I broke my right hand, already arthritic, holding on to Happy’s leash, and bracing myself as I fell against the hard rock. And I broke my hip. I am a long distance ocean swimmer, a marathon runner, and truly in superb shape. 5’7”, 119 lbs., and only 1 to 2% body fat, and at 65 I had just been diagnosed by my physician as being in “perfect shape”, a gnarly long distance swimmer that was all sinew. This is not good for someone to break a hip. I fell in one foot of lapping water, right at waters edge and cold on this stormy day. Fully dressed for the pouring rain and heavy winds I soaked clear through quickly and was dead weight. I tried crawling one foot at time. Happy stayed on his training leash, hooked to my broken hand. Movement was excruciating, and I soon let go of his leash, and lay there for about five minutes, then tried crawling again now only an inch at a time. I could not take the pain so lay there. Happy was frantic, racing around me, barking at me. This was not in our training manual. He saved my life. I grabbed his collar and he pulled me 25 feet, my screaming all the way from pain and holding on to the collar yelling in a whisper PULL. About thirty minutes passed and he got me to a driftwood edge of old dock and somehow got under me and WE, in tune with one another leveraged me to a sitting position against the driftwood, out of the water. Time has no logic here, I had a cell phone in my soaked jacket but could not reach it, and I had no idea of where I was, how much time had passed, or what I could do.

Happy, The Hero

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There were no houses in sight, of course, and no other winter beach walkers. We were alone. As hypothermia set in I gasped out “go get help” and he began running, leash dragging behind him. It felt like an eternity later, a lady appeared, whom Happy had frantically barked at to make her believe something was wrong. She had read his nametag, called my home, and soon the ambulances arrived. His persistence beat down her fear of a loose tough looking dog on the beach, incessantly barking at her. Part of my training includes the words slow and easy. Happy is smarter than I thought he was. He saved my life. The roles are now reversed. Happy is forced to have “no walks, no swimming at the beach, no adventures”, and “don’t jump on Dad.” Everyone was worried Happy would be too rambunctious, too much energy. Amazing again, I sat and talked with him for some time when I got home from the hospital and he has been the perfect dog. Slow and easy. It’s been almost a month since my surgery and Happy and I are now, more than ever, learning to walk together one step at a time. There is so much to learn.