I’m reposting an old post from a summer past as my contribution to tomorrow’s Dog Days collection. Sorry about that, but typing without an index finger that bends is a frustrating exercise.
Somewhere in those first few seconds of instinctive paddling, she discovered that she likes swimming. Maybe she loves swimming.
This week we discovered that our dog is a retriever. Of course, we knew when we bought her that her official title included the word, but she failed to live up to the promise of her name. She thought fetching was boring after a toss or two, but what she hated most of all was going into water any deeper than her knees.
Every summer before this, we’ve tried to coax her to swim with us. She knew it looked like fun and she wanted to be out there with the gang, so she’d make a half-hearted attempt to join us. But as soon as the water touched her belly, she’d turn around again and slink back to the shore. We tried gentle coaxing with sticks, throwing them out into the water for her to retrieve, but she was already an unenthusiastic fetcher, so she had no qualms about leaving a stick floating if fetching it required more than shallow wading.
Once the boys took turns carrying her out into deep water and letting her go. She was a strong and competent swimmer as long as the swimming was straight toward the shoreline. As soon as she reached the beach, she’d slink off to the bushes, crouching low, hoping to remain out of sight so she could avoid that happening again.
Friday night, the youngest son and I took her for a walk on the Miles Canyon trail. When we got to the little pool along the edge of the river that is good for swimming, my son tossed a stick just a few feet from the bank. I’m sure it looked like a simple enough fetch to the dog, so she jumped in willingly. What she didn’t know is that the bank drops off steeply in that place and there is no wading. Once you’re in, it’s swim or die.
Somewhere in those first few seconds of instinctive paddling, she discovered that she likes swimming. Maybe she loves swimming. Out she swam to the stick and then round and back to the bank. Again and again, round and round, eager for more when we grew tired.
Last night we took her with us to Long Lake. She ran down ahead to the beach and then out into the water to retrieve what she thought was a stick, but turned out to be the branch of a dead tree lying just under the surface of the water. The three of us tossed sticks for her until we all grew tired.
After we stopped tossing, she jumped in to swim out and greet some canoeists passing by. We had to call her back before she got close, since nothing makes paddlers more nervous than an enthusiastic dog swimming toward them.
Yes, after three summers coaxing, we suddenly have a retriever.
Friday, February 15, 2008 at 7:22AM 
