It's a Dog's Life

Mike Yale has always had animals, from the Irish setter who was with him for the first 14 years of his life, the pigs and cows on his farm in the late 1960s, and the guinea pigs and boa constrictor who shared his Toronto homes, to the five golden retrievers who have guided him around over the past 48 years. He is happiest when he is working with his dog, and has even claimed to be part golden retriever himself!

For Mike, life changed at age 17, when he got his first guide dog, Archie. Archie brought him enhanced mobility, independence and confidence. “I am a more complete person, a whole person, with a dog at my side,” Mike says. He has had five golden retrievers – he believes the breed is closest to his personality. His third dog, Mitch, lived to the ripe old age of 16. “My dogs tend to live longer than the average, due to living in the country and to the fact that I give my dogs lots of freedom, free runs, allow them to be dogs now and then. I am much less structured and disciplined than the dog schools recommend, but what I do works for me.”

It works for the dogs, as well, as Narella, his present guide, can attest. She is relaxed at home, playing ball in the backyard like your everyday pet, but becomes alert, confident and careful as soon as that harness is placed over her head. Mike has obtained all his dogs from Guide Dogs for the Blind, in San Rafael, California. He is one of their most successful veterans, though they probably wouldn’t admit it, as he’s broken every rule in their book. They have been good to him, though, fulfilling his detailed requests for a perfect canine companion.

“I have always told San Rafael that I require a few things in my dogs: adaptability for sure, as I have basically no schedule and presently do not have a steady job. I may be in the city one day, with subways and traffic, or at a lakeside another day, meetings where a dog must behave, or outings where a dog can play, and so on,” explains Mike. “The other thing I always want is a dog that loves water, as most of my holidays involve lakes or oceans or water somehow. Goldens generally love to swim. I play fetch with a tennis ball or stick with my dogs a lot on holidays. This is a game, but one with discipline woven into it, so it serves many purposes. I have a very special relationship with my dogs, unlike lots of blind folks who only use their dog to get around, as a tool. Bonding with my dogs has never been a problem. With Narella, my present dog, we bonded in the first few seconds, I am sure.”

Mike’s dogs are true members of the family. When Mitch was ailing in his last year, Mike stayed home to care for him. “I figured after 13 years or so with him caring for me, the least I could do was care for him in his last days,” Mike says. “When Raquel got cancer at age 10, instead of letting her slowly waste away at home, I took her to her favourite holiday spot way up north, and she had two fabulous weeks of swimming and playing and eating from friends’ barbecues, before she died. She is buried beside the river up there.”

Each of Mike’s dogs has been special. Archie showed him how independent he could be. Vargus showed the world how independent both of them could be. Mitch proved that a long guiding career, to age 15, was possible (the average retirement age is around 10!). Raquel was the parking-lot navigation queen, and Narella is the most adaptable, and the family clown.

Mike has taken all of them wherever the wind blew him, and has had to deal with ignorance and refusal of entry, both before and after the passage of laws guaranteeing him the right to bring his guide dog to any public place. Vargus led him through Europe in 1977, when guide dogs were still uncommon. Mike wrote a book about those travels, No Dogs Allowed, but it didn’t do Vargus justice. It didn’t cover his arrival in Canada as one of the first visible guide dogs, or his wanderings with Mike during the first 10 years in his newly adopted country. Now a second book, Golden Reflections, gives Vargus his due—and the chance to tell his side of the story. Catherine Bergart found it “charming, clever, touching, laugh-out-loud funny, sweet, sad, philosophical, educational, and downright fun.”

Mike believes the best relationship one can have is that between a human and  dog. “The love from a dog is without mind games, no head trips, no motives and consequences… Humans come and go, change their minds, while dogs have a consistency and tranquility unique in this world. I am not a religious person, but if there is truly a loving and caring God somewhere up there, he or she must be a dog.”

Golden Reflections is the remarkable story of a man and his best friend. It is available as a book and an MP3 audio disk read by the CBC’s Don Harron. Golden Reflections is available from Inclusion Press (www.inclusion.com) in either format for $25.