Maggie Shayne: Doggie in the Well!

Oh, what a traumatic event we experienced this past week! It was just an ordinary evening, and Wrinkles, my twelve year old bulldog, who's mostly blind and mostly deaf, woofed at the back door to go outside. Wrinkles and I have only been staying here in this particular house for six weeks and we're not entirely used to it yet. Wrink usually goes out the front door, but I saw no problem letting her out the back one, where there's a big porch for her to cross. I let her go, then sat at the computer, knowing she'd be ready to come in about three minutes later. About five minutes later, I got a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. I went to the door and she wasn't there. I walked around the lawn and she wasn't there either. I could just barely hear a very distant barking, but had a difficult time figuring out where it was coming from. It was going to be dark soon, and I got scared. Then I spotted a board missing beside the porch steps, and realized she must have missed the steps coming back, and walked underneath the porch instead. I pulled more boards off, laid on my belly and slid myself underneath. It was dark but I could see, and I slid under further, following the distant sound of her barking and knowing she was down way deeper than ground level. There was an old well under there. It had been covered but it must have been long ago, because apparently, one of the boards had broken when Wrinkles walked over it. I could hear her barking from the bottom of the well, but I couldn't see her. It was too dark. I talked to her, told her I was going to get her out, not to worry, then slid back out from under the porch, and got on the phone. The 911 operator said he wasn't sure if the fire department would respond for a dog in a well. I figured that was no problem, because they would certainly show up when I went down there after her and got stuck myself. I called everyone close enough to come, and within a few minutes two of my sons in law, and the local fire chief were also belly crawling under the porch, and a short while after that a whole crew of volunteer firefighters from the South Otselic FD were at my side.

It took an hour and a half. We had to pull floorboards up off the porch to enable us to have better access to the well. Twice, the firemen got a rope around Wrink, and began to pull her up, but both times she wriggled free and fell to the bottom again. I was nearly hysterical by then, and I don't EVER get hysterical. The well was so narrow there was almost no one who would fit down it. I kept trying to get them to let me go, but they were concerned the stacked stones that made up the sides of the well could come loose, and injure the dog, or worse, cave in completely. Finally, they sent their smallest-framed volunteer down, lowering him carefully with a harness. At the bottom he couldn't even bend over to pick up the dog. But he managed to inch her up onto her hind legs and eventually worked her up high enough to get his arms around her. At which point he grunted, "What do you FEED this dog?" Wrink is small, but weighs more than 60 pounds. Bulldogs are bulky.

Once he had a grip on her, the other firefighters pulled both dog and hero up to safety. Miraculously, Wrinkles was uninjured. Not even a scrape, not even a limp. She was fine. I took pics and thanked the firefighters profusely, of course, and they're getting a donation too.

I am so grateful to them for coming out and saving my poor old bulldog. They said it was a first for them, and all seemed to feel really good about a job well done. As well they should. Dogs are people, too!

Wrinkles is doing fine. None the worse for her trauma. I go outside with her every single time now and wait while she does her business and comes back. I'm just glad I've still got my little pal by my side. I don't think I knew just how important she was to me, until I thought I'd lost her.

Here's hoping next week's post is a little less dramatic!

Maggie