The Tale of Carrowkeel Sorley

The Tale of Carrowkeel Sorley, our Roddy

In 1971, when we had three dogs, they weren’t just any three dogs; they were a very particular set of dogs – like Liam Neeson’s skills in “Taken” – with a very particular set of tales, and tails. When we join the first verse of the poem I wrote at the time, Roddy was about 6 months’ old, while James and Snoopy were three-ish.

I include this bit of poetic self-indulgence merely as a means whereby you may acquaint yourself with the general tongue-in-cheekiness characteristic of all stories pertaining to our Roddy. This jocular approach is perhaps the only way to convey the reality of a very odd and dog-centric world my father created around this sweet, gentle, beautiful and very big Irish Wolfhound. Roddy was the love of his life and, as we hailed from Ireland, so must our Wolfhound. Ergo, my father found himself a breeder in Ireland, visited her and her hounds, loved what he saw and, a few months later, imported the dog of his dreams, this superb canine gent, directly from Ireland, when he (Roddy) was about 10 weeks old.

But before I continue with the tale of the dog/s, behold the poetic verse. I invite you:

The League of Nations in our house

Comprises canines three.

There’s Snoopy – he’s from Canada

And James – from Blighty, he.

Aer Lingus jetted Rod to us

Direct from Erin’s Isle.

When Snoo and Jim picked up the scent

They both commenced to smile.

And, thus you are whisked back through time to our 1970 canine world at 503 Lee Avenue, Waterloo, ON. We lived there from the fall of 1969, after my mother’s nervous breakdown and Electroshock Therapy (that’s another tale) until the summer of 1973 when we moved to the country and got ourselves a rural route…and, appropriately, set down rural roots.

Snoopy was black and white, likely part Beagle with, perhaps a bit of Spaniel in him…maybe even Lab. He was a fairly small fellow, and the smartest dog I’d ever encountered, with a sense of humour that you’ll find in very special dogs like Snoopy. I named him Snoopy because, of course, I loved his namesake. In fact, I think cartoon Snoopy, and his various personages, was really the only reason I read the Peanuts’ comic strip: to see what Joe Cool hanging around the Student Union, or the WWI flying ace atop his doghouse was up to on the days he made an appearance in Charles Schulz’s daily strip. I’ll confess that, years later, when I found a baby starling, turfed from his nest – a wee scaldy as we Irish ones call them - with a broken leg and gammy wing, my mother and I nursed him back to health and, of course, named him Woodstock because he and my Snoopy were inseparable.

I got Snoopy at a local pet shop for the grand sum of $15 which, even in 1969, was rather a good price. My mother was none too happy about having another dog, since our last one had been euthanized (he was riddled with cancer) while she’d been in the hospital, but I – an only child who only liked animals – was lost without a canine companion…so a deal was struck. I’d save up my rather minimal allowance and, when I found a dog for whatever amount of money I had, I could get him or her…preferably him because people weren’t as assiduous about having animals spayed and neutered in them there days, and I know my mother could never have handled a litter of pups in her condition which, what with her having lost two years of her memory, was still fairly delicate and dodgy.

So, off we went to get this new puppy for $15 only – 15 appropriately being my age at the time – and, upon completing the transaction, were told a free vet check was included. I was quite proud of myself, having negotiated such an excellent deal. We hied ourselves immediately hence to the Vet Clinic that provided the free check, and left with another $60 added to my mother’s VISA card as, while the check-up was free, the mandatory rabies shot and deworming were somewhat more expensive.

This was not a good start to my new dog ownership.

However, since this tale is about Roddy, I’ll leave the antics of my son Snoo for another time. I will, however, relate that he helped me study that very night for a Latin test and, of course, we got 100%. He was an exceedingly smart dog, was Snoopy. The Latin was a bit of a surprise, but whatever conglomeration of breeds went into the making of my wee Snoo, it was the smartest bits of each. I’ve had many a dog before and after, and have loved them all unconditionally and to the depth of my being, but there was never one who could match Snoopy for all ‘round perfect doggedness.

So, we’ll suffice to say Snoopy and I went along with our lives, me going to school, him waiting for me to come home, though I suspect he had a rather hefty daily schedule unbeknownst to me. My mother, of course, fell in love with him, too, so I have no doubt he spent his day by her side, car-tripping and helping out with dinner preparations, maybe the odd bit of gardening.

And life continued thus, with the usual bumps and grinds and disasters and arguments and fights and what have you, but that’s neither here nor there though, truth be told, it was all there. And then. But normalcy, whatever that was for me, my mother and father, ensued…until sometime in 1970 when a phone call set off a mad jaunt into comings and goings and hysteria and general brouhaha and, most important, the arrival of another dog, a year-old Blue Roan English Cocker Spaniel, James.

I swear to you, on any stacks of Bibles or Qur’ans or Torahs or dead or living people, that this tale is about Roddy the Irish Wolfhound. But the back story - as one may be wont to call it - must be told and is, in and of itself, I think fairly interesting and typical of the insanity that was forever insinuating its way in and around (rarely out of) my world.

Late one evening, sometime in 1970 (see above) , my father got a phone call from the Boston PD which was, as you might surmise, neither a run-of-the-mill, nor expected, communication. While I won’t mention names, I doubt anyone can be protected as this story relates to relatives. Of mine. Still, on the pretense of privacy consideration, I will just allude to association by blood. How many times removed is irrelevant. (They had been removed, in fact, from a mansion in Boston and put in police custody…but I’m getting ahead of myself.)

The Boston Police Department had been given my father’s name as someone who could help out in rather a sticky wicket of a situation. A male relative and his wife, and their dog, young James (it comes together), having retired from jobs in England, had taken positions as Governess/Nanny and Chauffeur/Gardener/Dogsbody (I don’t know all the details) in the home of some very wealthy family in Boston. Yes THAT Boston, the one in Massachusetts. What prompted this change of life at the change of life I do not know, but it was ill-conceived at the outset and ill-fated at the dénouement. Said couple were really raving loonies. To explain further may divulge identities but, between pills and booze and general overriding and underlying states of plum madness, they managed to have themselves thrown out of many a place over the course of their lives and, now, true to form, had been summarily extricated from the Boston Manor and relocated to the squad room, dog included.

The short version of this story is all that’s required as – and I do keep telling you this – the tale is not about them nor this, but about Roddy, so I’ll wrap about four months into a few paragraphs. Off drove my father to Boston (assisted by some sort of stay-awake pill prescribed the doctor for the occasion) – it was a very long drive – where he collected two relations (one blood, one by marriage) and one lovely soon-to-be-brother to my Snoopy, and drove them back to our house, where I suppose the plan was to figure out…what next?

What next, indeed? Well, the pair of them set about having rows and fights with each other; furniture (and epithets) were hurled at all hours of the day and night in the visitors’ quarters. Threats of murder and suicide were interspersed with great displays of lovey-doveyness, at which times the two twin beds in their room were pushed together for creature comfort. The third creature, James, by this time, was my dog and lived with me and Snoopy at the other end of the hall.

What with the nightly bouts of shouts and “get out”s that attended my attempts to slumber, I literally got no (or next to no) sleep for weeks on end. If you promise not to tell on my mother, I was so out of it the day I had to do a gymnastics routine as part of my Phys. Ed. exam, my wee innocent mammy gave me one of those doctor-prescribed-Boston-driving pills that morning with my tea and toast. I went from someone who could barely muster a toe touch to one producing an Olympics-worthy spectacle of cartwheels and handstands, somersaults and leaps the likes of which St. Mary’s High School in Kitchener, Ontario had never before witnessed in its gymnasium. I don’t have a clue what I did, but there was a sizable contingent of very surprised students and teachers, left with gaping mouths (I’m surmising) as I took my leave of the gymnastic mats that fine day.

Moving quickly along, there was an attempt to oust one of the offending parties down to her daughter in the West Indies, during which absence the other was as good as gold, a proper English gentleman whose only offense was calling me “Fat Bot”. While this was quite offensive, I’ll agree with you, it paled in comparison to what had been going on in the weeks prior.

At some point, and I can’t remember what sparked the last hurrah, said relative had us all lined up and was going to shoot us for no apparent reason. I don’t even remember if there were any guns involved; it was just all rather surreal, and more weird than scary. However, this last act of derring-do was enough to ensure derring-don’t any more and #2 blood relative offender was summarily, and by another blood relative, dispatched back to Merrie Olde England where the story no longer matters. All that matters is that, because it would have involved a long quarantine period to get the very English-born and bred English Cocker, James, back to whence he came, we got to keep wee Jimmy-Joe, making the whole horrible, insane, hurtling tornado of the previous few months all worthwhile.

And now, Carrowkeel Sorley, Call Name Roddy, can enter the story that was intended to be Carrowkeel Solely about him.

I expect from the moment my father suggested the idea, my mother was dead set against it. I know I was in rapture…getting another dog was excellence itself. But bringing an Irish Wolfhound puppy all the way from Ireland was the stuff of dreams, patriotic fervor and proper historical rectitude. Damn right we Irish should have our very own symbolic hound of legend and lore.

As much of a real dog as it is, the Irish Wolfhound is still the stuff of legends. The breed was closing in on extinction when, in the late 1800s, a Captain George Graham set about to revive and reinvigorate the breed and that he did. At the time we got our Roddy, the Irish Wolfhound was acknowledged as the world’s tallest dog breed. I have paid no attention to competing or developing dog breeds in the 40-plus years since, so there may be some double the size of our massive hound about these days. I’ll readily admit to not having seen them, but you never know, unless you know everything.

A brief – I promise – background of the Wolfhound legend is in order, especially because it was central to my own Master’s thesis in Irish history. The tale of Cuchulain I saw as a metaphor, an allegory, analogy, and an awful lot of similar words, for the fight for Irish freedom that led to the Easter Rising, Dublin 1916. True to my promise, I won’t drag you through all that, but feel free to go to Google or the Library to find out more. In Irish, “Cu” means “hound”. Dating back through the misty old muslin of time, around the year 500 AD, The Irish Wolfhound was the dog of Kings, Chieftains and nobility, a “sighthound” used for hunting elk and wolves and, even, a battle dog used to pull warriors‘ chariots.

A wee bit more on how Cuchulain got into this mix. Back in the mists previously mentioned, a young warrior lad (quite the spectacular specimen if one is to believe the spin), named Setanta, accidentally killed a watchdog of a man named “Chulain”. As absolution, and to assist until another dog was trained, Setanta offered to take the place of Chulain’s prized dog, thus rendering him “Cu”Chulain, the hound of Chulain. In this role, he was, of course, fearless and legendary, and myths and mad tales sprang up about his warrior’s “hero rage” and so on and so forth, but the point is, having an Irish Wolfhound – from Ireland – was nothing short of a canine “hallelujah chorus” for my father and me. My mother was not, admittedly, quite as enamoured of the goings-on.

Were I to tear this house to shreds (I yet live in the last house I shared with my parents, and have lived most of my life), I know I’d find all Roddy’s travel documents and passports and whatever else puppies needed to travel from the Emerald Isle, appropriately in March around Paddy’s Day, to Canada, but I’ll have to do my own remembering from what I think is fairly accurate information I have stored in whatever part of my head recalls every minute of every day from 50 years ago, but not even a miniscule moment from yesterday.

Prior to Roddy’s arrival…I’m getting ahead of myself. Prior to the arrival of the Irish Wolfhound male puppy – my father planned to use him for stud because, truly, said pup was an exceptional specimen – the preparations were, I’m sure far greater than any preceding my birth, at least on my father’s part. Books were ordered and lists of suitably heroic and Irish Gaelic names were compiled and compared. If there was another book, magazine article, archive or nomenclature befitting the arrival of the crown prince of Ireland, I don’t know where it possibly could have existed. I would confidently attest we had them all.

The diet, the exercise, the regimen of regiments, the kennel, the run, the perfect firmament for the young lad’s perambulations about the backyard and beyond were sourced, scrutinized and established. When a name was finally selected, I’m surprised black smoke didn’t come puffing out our chimney. For all I know, it did. He would be Carrowkeel (the name of the kennel in Ireland) Sorley (named for Sorley Boy MacDonnell, an Ulster chieftain of the 16th century, likely born in Co. Antrim, like I was…as I was born in Belfast, Co. Antrim in Ireland). I doubt my birthplace entered into the choice of chieftain as namesake. That would be his official name on his registration papers, and how he would be presented in the dog show world that loomed in his future.

But we wouldn’t call him that. Far too regal a name for everyday usage. No, we would call him Roddy, after Roddy McCorley (rhymes with Sorley…clever, no?) “who goes to die on the bridge of Toome today”. Now, young Roddy McCorley was no slouch either. He – also from Co. Antrim; I’m sure my father was thinking of me – was a member of the United Irishmen and taken prisoner after that group’s failed 1798 Rebellion against British rule. He was hanged at Toome, also in Co. Antrim.

Being me, and given to song parodies, I did a rather clever one many years on when Roddy was a rather large and spoiled (but lovely) lump of a dog, based on the song commemorating “Roddy McCorley”. I’m singing it now, as I type. It’s a shame you can’t hear it or know, already, all the elements that went into it from the life that we lived after the arrival at 503 Lee Avenue of the young pupstart, Roddy McGrath.

I’ll be getting to those now.

Other than that it was sometime in early 1971 and I had to look up to see if the airport in Toronto was at that time yet called a) Malton Airport, or b) Toronto International Airport or c) its current name, Pearson International, I don’t remember much about the arrival of Roddy. He was delivered unto us in the cargo area of Toronto International Airport (I googled it), after a stopover in Dorval Airport, QC (where he had been let out of the cage and had a grand old time with the on-shift workers), hale and hearty and not in the least the worse for wear after his very long, very close-quartered incarceration across the Atlantic. He was a gorgeous big puppy, long, already-hinting-at-muscular legs and massive feet, perfect on an Irish Wolfhound youngster as it indicates growth potential, sweet and friendly, and happy and playful and everything a Daddy could ever want in a son. And I in a brother because, brother, he sure did take over any hopes I had of being the fair-haired child in the eyes or esteem of my pater…at least not so that anyone, including me, could tell.

While I don’t remember the exact amounts or the order of the many goodies that were presented Roddy daily to sate his hunger and ensure the excellence of his development, suffice to say it was frequent and a lot. I do remember he had a complicated and most indulgent diet. There was no way this paean of Celtic virtue would not be the biggest, best and most perfect specimen of an Irish Wolfhound. If the breed saviour, Captain Graham were not already dead and gone, my father would have stopped at nothing to ensure the good Captain had more than a few heart palpitations if ever he set his eye upon what was to be the utmost in Wolfhound perfection. Sure we all had the be all and the end all of Irish wolf dogs. Roddy put the”Cu “in Chulain (and, yes, in Cu-te) and, in fairness and truth, he did become the “Gentle Giant” the breed purports to be.

But, to continue with young Roddy’s dietary regimen: Each and every day, he consumed unlimited portions of kibble, some milk meal, I believe was called Dari-Lac, full of supplements and magical ingredients to enhance growth, cooked kidneys for which my father went to a local butcher (my mother cooked them, I believe; I doubt any butcher would have been so accommodating), soda bread and/or potato bread (my mother baked), a clatter of reject eggs fried with said bread just before bedtime, cheese by the cracker barrel and, just to put the tin hat on it, tins of sardines whenever his pater believed further victuals were required.

When my father first read how good fish oil was for whatever part of Roddy required piscatarean supplementation, it was off to the grocery store to purchase all in stock. At the time, I remember quite clearly that sardines sold for 6 cents a tin. All area grocery stores had to be scoured on regular bases, by each of us, so as not to draw attention to the Top Secret furry Operative we were growing back at 503 Lee. We may have taken to wearing disguises for all I can recall. The upshot of it was, of course, the gradual, then rapid, price increase on sardine tins given the sudden run on the product. My last memory of the cost was 49 cents a tin. I suspect sardines became less and less of a Roddy staple over the months thereafter.

When my father first read how the perfect paw for the perfect specimen of a perfect Irish Wolfhound was virtually guaranteed if said paw were to have access to a particular type of gravel for – oh, say, an entire backyard – it behoved us that my father owned a general construction company and, as such, could source not only general, but very specific, construction items. And, so, not long after, at least two very large loads of this gravel were dumped in our backyard.

“There you go, Roddy,” sez I. “Not so fast, there,” sez my oul’ fella. “Those need to be raked

over the yard.” Now, I won’t claim that I had to do all the raking, but I do recall doing a lot of it and its being a most unpleasant task.

At any rate (none remunerative), the gravel got spread over as much of the backyard as it could cover, about ¼ acre or thereabouts, leaving Roddy plenty of area to walk on regular ground…but then plenty more to traverse on hallowed, very special, graveled ground, destined to ensure the nice, bunchy feet of the prized Wolfhound. And, so, my father was happy for his boy.

But not for long.

Why was my father not happy for his boy and his boy’s gravel and future bunched feet for long?

Well, it turned out, quite unexpectedly (though, my mother and I thought quite hilariously) that Roddy wouldn’t sent one precious paw, not a toe, not a nail, anywhere near the bloody gravel that now glittered like jewels in the crown in the sunlight across our backyard, where once there had been lawn and flowers and little nature-y things.; but was now nought but stones and smallish rocks and pebbles. Let he who be without sin cast the first stone. I felt completely entitled to that honour, except for the joy I felt at my father’s ill temper about this ridiculous plan gone so quickly south. It was a tad sinful. My mother and I relished this tale between ourselves for decades ever after…my father’s being wrong, his discomfiture and sheer ire (we were all from “Ire”land) at this waste of time and money and, I’m sure his fury that we were laughing at him. Not to his face, of course, but he knew.

So nothing to do for it but pick them all back up again. One by one? Of course not. Sure, you’d bring in some very specific construction contraption to suck them all up or load them some other way. You’d think that, wouldn’t you?

Well, you’d be wrong. It was one by one, and picking them up was the job accorded my mother and me. We spent untold hours, me every day after school into the evening and her after dinner (it was spring time so lots of evening hours for important outdoor work). If you imagine a lot of negative chatter and swearing and total disbelief expressed in many fashions attended this restitution of the backyard and removal of stonehegemony, you’d be quite correct. I do remember tears of laughter, though, too, as we collogued at the insanity of the whole thing.

And that, I must stop to note, was when I, with my penchant for writing, was tapped as the one who must document this entire Roddy imbroglio for posterity. In truth, I have been trying, since then – when I was 17 – to do just that, but was still too involved in it, in other ridiculous scenarios that dogged me appropriately my entire life, in life involving my parents…always too much in and of it to write about it.

I’m past 60 now and only finding the will and focus and distance to impart what those years were like. How insane! How unintentionally – always unintentionally – funny! Often how sad and somewhat soul-crushing but, somehow, there would be an iota, a vestige of humour about everything. I wouldn’t be here, past 60, otherwise, I can assure you.

The “Rodding” Stone story could have ended just there, but it continued. Those restored stone piles rested at the side of our house at 503 Lee for three years, at which time they moved, with us, out to the country – along with Roddy and Snoopy but, sadly, not James, who had been killed quite deliberately by a wholly evil driver, in front of our house, in front of our driveway, in front of us, then stopped and got out to say he was tired of our dogs being on the road. They were only on the road during the time it took to get them into the back of the car to go out to the country where we had a new property which would soon be our new home…where another mad story began but, before it began, we buried James there at the new home, under one of the apple trees.

As sad as is the tale of Jimmy’s demise, it does invite description of auto travel with two adults, one teenager, two smallish dogs and one humungous lump with massive legs shooting out in every direction and a huge head bobbing o’er top, slobbering happily along for the ride. Generally, if it were just that ensemble, there would be room for me on the back seat, squished up against the door to ensure Roddy had ample room lest he grow a millimetre en route. Snoopy and Jimmy usually were in the back of what was then a station wagon, and I should have been back there with them. I wonder now why I wasn’t given I don’t think seatbelts were yet mandatory. However, if a friend should join us on such an excursion (I had one of those), the seat would be given over to Roddy entirely whilst we subhumans sat on the car floor or, should he move a hairsbreadth, we’d leap to either end of him for a peek out the window and, maybe, a breath of fresh air. And these weren’t always short trips, mind you.

Unbelievable! Yes! I agree! And, yet, even then, angry as I’d be, infuriated at being treated so badly, I could see how funny it was in some weird, self-flagellating way.

While I do truly enjoy the stone story, I think this last recounting is the most apt and revelatory of the lot. In our then family room, we had a fireplace, a TV, a piano and chair, a La-Z-Boy recliner (my father’s), an armchair (my mother’s) and a chewed-up bed settee (Roddy’s). I was allowed to sit on it usually, and I’d oft sneak Snoopy and James up behind me. On one evening, and I would swear we were watching “All in The Family”, yerman Roddy took himself off to the kitchen for a drink of water and, when he returned, found me in his place, albeit a very small bit of his space. This befuddled him and, in the split second that was his befuddlement, my father said to me, “Sit on the floor and give Roddy his chair.”

Ta, Da.

I adored big Roddy, despite what these tales may appear to reveal. None of it was his fault, the silly big lug, but I do have one more wee bit to add, and I don’t add it to be mean or take pleasure in it. It actually saddens me.

My father took Roddy to Obedience lessons and all that obligatory sort of thing for one who plans to show and fashion a Champion dog. And then, he started to show Roddy, in his official Carrowkeel Sorley entity. In the early days of showing, when he was still a wide-eyed innocent, big Rod did great and swept all the prize categories. But once our Roddy the victor matured, he got a bit of a hot head in the show ring: if he caught even a glimpse of my mother or me in the stands, he determined this reason enough to attack every dog within reach, earning him the sobriquet “Rowdy” and “Carrowkeel Surly”. He was summarily banned from the show circuit for life.

Did Roddy care a whit or give a proverbial? Not bloody likely. He just settled into his big, spoiled, hand-fed, kidney-cooked, egg-feted, bread-baked hairy life, scared any potential wrongdoers and took the odd constitutional where my father encouraged him to kill groundhogs, which – bad enough as that is – culminated much worse with his killing a cat. That was the end of such encouragement, but too little, too late…though too much, too late for the feline victim.

Our Roddy lived a good Canadian life for an Irish dog and he enjoyed it for many years. The end gets a bit sad and there are teary bits, so I have no intention of reducing the very wonderful and larger than life character that was our Roddy, Carrowkeel Sorley, my father’s only son and my only sibling, to such a feeble end.

In Grade 3, I had written a speech about my plan to get an Irish Wolfhound one day. It began with a wee bit of breed lore: “Gentle when stroked, fierce when provoked, this is the Irish Wolfhound”. Indeed, Roddy was our gentle giant until he hit the show ring where, provoked or un-, he would have killed rings round him. Harking (barking?) back to the legend of Cuchulain, I suspect this was his warrior’s “hero rage”.

Never mind our rage at having to pick up all those bloody stones.