Little Betty Pattertail passed away earlier this summer. (Photo by Kate Hamilton)
The Patterdale Hall Diaries | In the midst of life
- Published: July 30, 2024
By Chris Wyatt
June 10, 2024
Well, we didn’t get years or months with little Betty Pattertail — we only got a couple of weeks.
Her cancer started spreading rapidly and most of the tumors were ulcerating. We did the kindest thing and put her to sleep.
She was a wonderful dog, a stray who found a loving home. She changed our lives. The whole family was with her until the end. I could write paragraphs about her, but I’ll restrict myself to a couple of little memories.
Betty had a piercing bark. She was an 18-pound terrier with a pair of fully functional lungs. Our house in Yellow Springs is next to the Catholic church, and Betty was in full voice on Sundays. She hated the churchgoers. There was, however, a problem with her bark: It was the same resonant frequency as our doorbell. This meant that when she barked, the vibration caused our doorbell to ring, which then made her bark more. It was a sonic death spiral.
Fortunately, when Archie joined the household, he had a robust bark for a small dog and it didn’t ring the bell. Later, a loose dog crushed Archie’s windpipe, altered the pitch of the bark and he happily joined Betty’s choir. Such joy.
Betty was also very good at catching squirrels. She was a stray, and it was apparent that she had lived on trash and squirrel for months.
In her time with us, she caught 17 squirrels. I kept count because she was incredibly fast and I had never seen anything like it. Watching her get between a squirrel and its tree was amazing. It was like she was doing higher math in her head.
Then BAM.
Patterdales were bred to hunt foxes on Cumbrian hillsides and Betty had all those genes.
Despite being a killer, Betty was the sweetest thing. Karen snapped her ankle last November and the pooch spent her last seven months in bed with Karen. She literally stayed by her side 24/7 — except to go on a walk with me, once per day. At the end, she had tumors in her paws and that’s when we knew it was time to say goodbye.
June 11, 2024
It looks like we will have a run of absolutely beautiful June days.
Weather Underground is indicating that it will get into the 90s by the end of the week and as long as we have aircon, Karen will survive. There is no aircon out at Patterdale Hall but there always seems to be a breeze, so I will open both doors and get a fan running.
It really is paradise out there. I spent yesterday weeding and eating black raspberries, which are now abundant. I’ll take Karen and her mum out there later today so that they can graze on the berries, too. They are plentiful and delicious.
We also have lots of wildflowers to plant — a generous gift from our friend Eve — which will need to go in the ground today. The squash I planted have all popped up. I put three seeds in each hole in case some didn’t germinate — but they all have.
I guess I should pinch out the weaker plants, but they all look pretty strong. I may just leave them and see what happens.
Ah, the life of the idle gardener. Bliss.
Also, it seems like I will have to get used to writing with little Archie on my lap. I’m OK with this — he is a good boy and only a lil dog. Now, it’s time to take the lil dog out for a sniff and a bark.
June 12, 2024
I push mow a lot at Patterdale Hall, but not today.
Today would have been my Grandpa Maurice’s 108th birthday, and so in honor of that I’ll write a bit about lawns and the English.
Maurice’s lawn was perfect, and the smell of a well-oiled, petrol-driven lawn mower reminds me of him instantly. He died when he was 61 and never got to enjoy retirement — tragically.
Karen’s Grandfather Bob also had a perfect lawn that he mowed twice per week and watered with a secret fertilizer. Bob’s lawn was so immaculate that children were not allowed to sit on it unless they sat on small squares of carpet edged with duct tape. I’ve seen the photos. It’s true. Lawn chairs were allowed on the lawn, begrudgingly.
There is a wonderful, apocryphal tale about the lawns at Arundel Castle on the south coast of England. These lawns are staggeringly beautiful — approaching perfection.
The story goes that an American tourist approached the groundskeeper at Arundel and asked him what the secret was to such beautiful lawns, but the groundskeeper refused to divulge his secrets. The tourist went back every day for a week, but the groundskeeper would not tell him what that secret was.
Finally, on the last day of his vacation, the tourist offered the groundskeeper 100 pounds if he would tell him. Smiling, the groundskeeper took the money and said: “You feed and mow them every day for 500 years.”
The weather is spectacular today, and so, I will sit in the shade of the tulip poplar and read my new recipe book.
My chicken chasseur is made and resting. Life is good.
*Originally from Manchester, England, Chris Wyatt is an associate professor of neuroscience, cell biology and physiology at Wright State University. He has lived in Yellow Springs for 17 years, is married and has two children and an insane Patterdale terrier.
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