Last year, when I resigned as a Greyhound Ambassador I wasn’t adopting a Terminator stance and muttering ‘I’ll be back’ but here I am, back in the role.
I remained in close contact with some of the Ambassadors and Mark Bird, and despite speculation in some quarters remained on good terms with all parties.
So why did I resign? Last year my world was turned upside down by my husband going from being an extremely fit, active and healthy Olympic sailing coach to being completely crippled by a rare genetic spinal defect which had hitherto been undetected. This all happened within a very few grisly weeks. Since August last year he has spent most of his time in various hospitals having the original defect rectified, physio, then back to hospital for life saving surgery to rectify the damage done to an artery at some point during the original procedures to repair the defect.
During the hours of the lifesaving surgery I waited at home for the phone call to tell me whether I was a widow or not. As you would expect I passed the waiting hours browsing Greyhound Data and making a list of the dogs I could buy with the insurance pay-out. Just to make this even more special, it all took place on New Year’s eve! Suffice to say I’ve had better festive periods. So now you know; I had far too much on my plate.
I passed the intervening months getting more involved with my racing dogs and reading really interesting and outlandish things about myself on various sites. I never knew I had such a fascinating life – in other peoples’ imaginations. The reality however is far more mundane, I had planned to have a slight change in career direction and stopped doing the multiple dog walking that I had been doing and was all set to concentrate on walking the dogs that couldn’t be walked with other dogs for whatever reason.
But with himself being laid up and not in a position to bring home the bacon I took up the offer of some part time work at the kennel where some of our dogs are. This was the first time I’d worked in an exclusively racing kennel. I’d worked in a kennel that had part racing and part retired but I stayed with the retired dogs. I had a good idea of what was involved but during the past few months I’ve got a far better handle on it. All I can say is that I wish I’d been doing this decades ago.
Jane’s grandson Jack joins the ranks of fundraising volunteers.
I love working with the dogs, getting to know them all and being a big part of the successes of the kennel. The trainer, Dave Jeans who is attached to Swindon then made me an offer that I couldn’t refuse. My husband’s continuing incapacity had become worrying, he was making slow progress but anyone who owns racing dogs will know what I’m talking about, we have 8 racing dogs and they’re one hell of a commitment. What makes them all more of a commitment was that we’d bred them all and have an emotional tie to them that cannot be untied.
Although I didn’t say anything, Dave could see how worried I was and said that I could fetch all the dogs to his kennel and he would increase my hours so that I could get some way towards covering the kennel bill. Of course I jumped at this offer so on New Year’s Eve I went up with Dave’s partner to pick the rest of the dogs up. I hadn’t been able to visit them for quite some time and was so pleased to see them. I saw them safely settled in their new kennels and went to visit my husband and as I’ve already explained, the day went rapidly downhill from then.
For anyone who doesn’t know, working in a greyhound kennel is hard work, really hard work, , long hours bad pay but if you’ve got your heart and soul in it it’s the best job in the world. Getting to know all the dogs, all their different personalities, watching them all getting so excited on race days, particularly when it’s them that bounces out of the kennel to go to the van, getting bitten by an over enthusiastic play nipper, laughing at the lazy ones who would be just as happy going back to sleep as going to the track, although oddly enough they’re the best racers. Then passing the odd bits of down time trading humorous insults with the trainer (I had to say that because he doesn’t know that I’m very serious with my insults) There were a few occasions, in the pouring rain, when getting the dogs in and out of the paddocks to empty and then drying them off whilst I was getting wetter and wetter when I remembered back to previous days and I would think ‘God, I used to have an office, I had meetings with big cheeses, I had a flash car, I didn’t have to go out in the rain and go home filthy’. But then the sun comes through the clouds not only in the sky but in my mind and I remember why I packed those jobs in. I never heard skylarks from my office window either.
My dogs took to Swindon like ducks to water and they’ve been running really well, much to my surprise as anyone else’s. It’s been a joy to watch them and a privilege to own them through all of this. Something that I realised was that I don’t like parading my own dogs, I’d much rather be up on the terraces or in the grandstand watching them. But being a kennel hand has meant that if someone else is taking my dogs racing then I’m at the kennel watching them on the streaming on my phone. I think my trainer would rather me be at the kennel than fretting and worrying at the track and then behaving like a big kid when they won.
My home life trundled along with my husband in hospital and me emailing Mark Bird and telling him how to do his job. He usually replied with apparent good humour, but I could hear his jaw clenching and knuckles whitening even through the ether. I kept in touch with some of the Ambassadors as well and whilst not really being on the inside track I kept enough of a finger on the pulse of racing to find out some of what was going on behind the scenes. During one of my exchanges with Mark in which I told him how sick my husband had been, he suggested I start doing the lottery because my luck was due for a change. Well my luck did change, but it wasn’t just my luck, it was the whole of the world because the world got Coronavirus! Cue everything being turned upside down again.
Racing stopped, we all went into lockdown and my husband came home from hospital because they wanted to clear as many people as possible out of the wards just in case, and anyway he was safer at home than he was in hospital. Of course, that last bit hadn’t factored in the likelihood of me murdering him and burying him in the garden – give me a poorly greyhound to look after any day.
I started off passing the time for us playing ‘Listeria Lotto’ and Brucellosis Bingo’ with the out of date contents of the cupboards and the freezer. Best before dates are a rough guide, even when they’re May 2008. Helping my husband with his physio has been gratifying, particularly when he screams. I brought home one of the dogs from the kennel which wasn’t showing much promise so having the house cluttered up with disabled stuff and greyhounds makes every new day a challenge. I’ve also been involved with some of the Greyhound Trust stuff and a few other things, working in a small way with Mark Bird and a couple of the Ambassadors. THEN – after some discussion I was asked to consider returning as an Ambassador. I gave this a great deal of thought and despite all the other pressures on my life I decided to accept, and during lockdown it was either that or do the garden. And besides Mark Bird said that I could have first class travel aboard the Gravy Train. I am now awaiting my GBGB branded Fortnum and Mason’s hamper consisting of a jar of Happy Shopper coffee, a packet of arrowroot biscuits and a bar of carbolic soap.
Like everyone else, I am waiting for an end to this dreadful plague that has befallen the world. Like everyone else, I can’t wait to get back to normal, go racing, go out for dinner and be able to have a laugh with my husband outside the house somewhere. Let’s all follow the guidelines and stay safe; we’ll meet on the other side of all this I hope.
