This coming May will mark the ten thousandth mile that my best friend and I have spent walking the avenues, streets, and byways of Radnor and Lower Merion Townships. My best friend is an 81 pound 4 year old Chocolate Lab that goes by the name Colby, although he’ll answer to anything if you stop and talk to him on one of our walks. Colby’s mission in life is to kiss everyone that we pass, so be ready when you see us coming. I promise to do everything I can to limit it to a hug.
Colby and I both feel that the ‘Mainline’ is the greatest neighborhood in America, and this feeling only grows stronger with the more people we meet along our walks. Radnor Township has changed since I was student at Radnor High back in the late sixties, but the flavor and the spirit of the Welsh settlers is still there. The strong sense of community found in towns like Wayne and Garret Hill in unmistakable. Lower Merion has a slightly more cosmopolitan feel, but the energy you experience when walking through towns like Narbeth and Ardmore is so visceral that it makes keep coming back for more.
Colby and I spend most of our time walking between Suburban Square and the Devon Horse Show. Our average walk takes about two hours. Our main routes are Lancaster, Haverford and Montgomery avenues, with many detours and sidetrips down the smaller streets that connect them. From Colby’s perspective no playground, elementary school or senior center is ever to be passed by without his special brand of ‘canine hello’. No ball or Frisbee is ever safe when Colby is in the area. There was a saintly priest, named Fr, Deery, that traveled the Mainline on his bicycle thirty years ago, putting medals around the necks of every kid he passed. I sometimes think that Colby is a reincarnation of the holy man, with his own brand of medal…the sloppy kiss.
The residents of both townships have become our biggest fans and benefactors, leaving men’s rooms open at schools and ball fields, water spigots on so we can refill our bottles, and always offering a dry towel on those really hot and sticky summer days. Several times in a bad lightning storm one of these kind souls has driven us home. To show his appreciation Colby would spend the entire ride shaking the water off himself totally soaking the driver, but to their credit they never said a word.
I’ve now learned to look at the world through the eyes of my 81 pound canine friend, and see it entirely different than I did over 4 years ago. I was a runner and triathlete until I broke my hip while cycling one day, resulting in hip replacement surgery. As part of my recovery my doctor suggested that I not run but I should walk. This was a major blow to both my ego and psyche. What would life be like if I couldn’t run? In spite of this letdown I decided it was something that I had to try. If Colby hadn’t been there to get me through it, I think I would have abandoned walking years ago.
Colby has taught me to slow down and look at and smell things that I had previously missed. During our years of walking together we would experience’ being in the moment’ of where we were and who we would meet. This was something I used to totally miss when running alone. Before my injury I was always in that ‘zone’ that runners get into, focusing on the finish only, and the time you finished in.
Just before my hip replacement surgery my son graduated from the University of Maryland. He decided to move back home and along with him came his new chocolate brown, bundle of joy, baby Lab. It had been a few years since our ‘Westie’ (West Highland Terrier) has passed away so getting used to a larger dog was going to be something really new. Shortly after moving back home our Son got a job, which resulted in his relocation to West Chester county New York. Because of our son’s busy new schedule it was decided that Colby would stay with us, his adopted grandparents, and we would love and care for him, and try to entertain him in proper ‘Labrador’ style.
For those of you familiar with Labs, that means anything that involves motion, so Colby instantly took to accompanying me on my walks. No day was too hot, no distance too long. He was ready on a seconds notice, and you had to be careful not to accidentally say the word ‘Walk’ in another context. He would whine and moan until you finally took him outside for a jaunt, even if you had just gotten back from a 2 hour, 8 mile walk to Narberth and back.
Colby and I would like to share with all of you the many wonderful people we meet and experiences we have every day along our 2 hour walks through Radnor and Lower Merion. Our walks have changed both of our lives, and in my case my way of looking at the world. I like to think we have brightened up the lives of the folks we meet a little too!
Walking with Colby has opened up a window that only the pure joy of an unbridled, freedom seeking, Chocolate Lab on a daily mission of adventure could unlock.
Travel through that window with us as we rediscover the true magic that exists in this wonderful neighborhood we all call the ‘Main Line’
