My Beagle and Me - The puppy years

I finally watched Marley and Me, a hilarious tale of Marley, a "clearance pup", hyper-active, storm-fearing, trouble-causing Labrador and his humans, the Grogan family. I laughed at his antics, sympathized with the Grogans and as warned, cried bucketfuls at the end when the family had to finally "let Marley go" when Marley was ill with a serious stomach disorder.

I couldn't help but think about my relationship with Kess, my beagle. J and I welcomed her into our family 7 years ago. For us, she is more than a dog, more than a pet - she is our child.

There are some parallels between a puppy and a baby, although it is much easier having a dog than a child. As part of her "potty training", every time she woke up from sleep, after play and after meals, we used to place her in a small fenced area in our garden to pee and poo. Of course, she didn't always cooperate. The worst times were when she woke up at the wee hours in the morning and whined to be let out of her crate. Bleary-eyed and groggy, we would let her out and place her into her fenced-in spot. We would then sit on the bench and waited, and waited some more. Our neighbours probably thought we were wonky!


Like Marley, trouble is also Kess' middle name. She did not like to kept in a confined area. We had to abandon our noble ideas of crate training as she would just whine and claw at the crate door. We then decided to keep her at the laundry area next to our kitchen - a bigger area should do the trick, so we thought. We fenced the area off with dog fencing and went off to bed. A couple of hours later, our blissful sleep was interrupted by a heart-wrenching yelp of pain. We jumped out of bed and rushed to the back. Our little beagle pup, in her quest to escape from her "prison", had tried to climb over the dog fencing and had gotten her paws stuck in the gaps. This was the start of her famous escapades, and we knew we should have named her "Houdini" after the famous magician and escapologist.