Finlay
15th September 1997 to 7th May 2011
Our long loved hound
So soon after we said goodbye to Bailey,
now it is the turn of his twin brother Finlay. Finlay came to live with
us on 24th August 2002, when he was almost five, so we had him eight
and a half years --- longer than any other dog. His first owner no
longer wanted him, and our reputation as Basset rescuers (Jemima and Arbuckle)
led us to him. When he came to our house, Finlay spent a minute or so
checking the place out, then jumped into an arm-chair and curled up to
nap, for all the world like he was thinking "ahh, home at last." (This
was long before we realised that Bassets' jumping on and off furniture
was bad for their backs.) He and Jemima got on very well, although
(perhaps because his first owner had brought him up to be a show dog)
he didn't romp with Jemima the way Seren had. But he wanted to make friends with everyone, and was surprised to find some animals (e.g. cats) didn't reciprocate.
When we got him, Finlay's name was BJ, but he
had such a serious demeanour that we thought he needed a name with more
gravitas. Before we had him "snipped" he was always vigilant, even
tense, in the company of male dogs (though a real sweetie at home).
Afterwards he was much more relaxed in the park, but still acted
like a security guard, walking the perimeter sniffing out information,
and leaving his own scent-messages regularly to show he'd checked in.
At that time he was obsessed by balls (but only those that belonged to
other dogs). He would casually stroll pass another dog, pick up a ball
when nobody was watching and carry it away unobserved, hidden inside
his big floppy mouth.
Another surprise with young Finlay was how much he liked to walk. At
first, he just wanted to go west, and keep on going. But soon Finlay
and I were heading off in all directions, often for more than two
hours, on a Saturday morning. I remember once, he had picked up an abandoned ball on
Kenmore ovals, and then came across an abandoned sandwich. I thought
"he'll have to drop the ball now." But he didn't. He moved the ball
further back on his mouth, then picked up the sandwich, and walked all
the way home like that. Once there, he walked calmly up to the back yard, spat them both out, ate the
sandwich, and then settled down to chew the ball. In
2004 when Bailey came to live with his brother (after Jemima had passed
on) we had two Bassets who liked long walks. Eventually I decided to
chart the more adventurous ones, which you can see below. Our home is
the dot in Jay Park, and I've circled the suburbs / locales we reached:
from Lone Pine to Mt Cootha, and from Kenmore Hills to Chelmer. Some of
the walks mapped below are no longer possible, as new houses have been
built on the vacant land we explored.
Many of the long walks above happened even after both boys had ruptered
disks, requiring back surgery and long recuperation (Bailey in 2005,
Finlay in 2006). Not long after Finlay also followed his brother in
losing the sight in one eye through glaucoma. But at Christmas-time in
2007, Finlay lost the sight in his second eye too, which Bailey never
did. It made remarkably little difference to him. If his nose bumped
into something he just quickly tilted it down and changed direction. He
even used his pendulous ears to feel for the level of the ground, so he
could tell if there was a step up or down. By this time, the boys were
too old for exploratory walks, so we started to drive them to new
places to give them new smells to think about. Even in unfamiliar territory it
was easy to forget that Finlay was blind, so confidently did he set off
on his own, in whatever direction he wanted to go. (Finlay in the lead
below, in 2009.)
And he could still keep up his hobby, by sniffing out a
finished toilet roll in the recycling bin (2011). The accompanying
sketches are by our friend, artist/physicist/philosopher Rob
Spekkens from early 2007.
In the end, it was Finlay's brain, not his body, which
let him down. He started to become more anxious, and during the
Brisbane floods of January 2011, he got so
upset by the continual rain that we had to move Bailey away. Despite
the best medication, he just got worse, until he wouldn't sleep more
than a few hours at a time, and spent most of his waking hours pacing
around and whimpering, unconsolable. He lost weight, and didn't
wag for us anymore. The only pleasure he seemed
to get was if he met a puppy on a (now very slow) walk, and we felt
this wasn't enough to balance the anxiety he was suffering at
home. Below is one of our first photos, and one of our last, at
almost the same spot in the park (the cement path is new). Its been a
long journey for you my faded friend, but far too short for us.
