Rambles with Bramble
Gaining a canine companion not only gets you out walking more, but also gives you a whole new appreciation of the natural world, discovers
We can’t possibly get a dog, I’m far too busy,” was my initial short and terse response, but of course I was wrong. With my wife Christina and son Zachary taking my recalcitrance as their cue to act like dogs with a bone, it was only a matter of time before the pack forced me to cave in to their demands.
Once I finally relented, the decision as to choice of breed was relatively painless. With my own father always claiming an allergy to cat and dog fur, I’d had a ‘dog-less’ childhood, which contrasted with Christina’s upbringing, during which a Border Collie called Tess had been an everpresent feature. Happy for her to take the lead, my only canine stipulations were that the dog should hail from a “proper-sized” breed and crucially did not possess the “hectoring wildlife” genes. Once assured by my spouse that Border Collies were firstly, on the big size of medium, and secondly, preferred rounding things up to chasing them, then it was all systems go.
Bramble originated from a litter in the Yorkshire Dales and seamlessly settled down to life in his new home like a duck to water. He grew at a prodigious rate in those first few months. My first revelation about owning a Border Collie came when the penny dropped as to how much exercise he would require, which, in a nutshell, is a lot. Certainly one huge advantage to living in the heart of the rural West Country means that the countryside commences just beyond our doorstep, so the walks were there, but how would I find the time to use them?
Only after a simple audit of my time did I realise I was nowhere near as busy as I thought. By marginally cutting down on some of my ‘phone-faffing’ and TV viewing, for example, I was suddenly able to perform the magic trick of clawing back an hour seemingly out of nowhere. Additionally, while my presenting job does frequently take me away, being self-employed means I’m at home more often than not, with the result that I have become Bramble’s de facto ‘canine companion’. Eighteen months down the line, I can state with confidence that is absolutely fine by me.
Quite possibly our favourite walk starts in our home village of Chew