If you’ve been reading here long enough, you know about our crazy decision to acquire two Airedale Terriers, Duncan and Henson.

If you haven’t, a quick recap: Steve ran beagles all his life, but took a break from dogs to raise kids, and we lived in a house in town that was not dog friendly for a few years. When we knew we’d be moving to the farm, Steve started researching “the perfect dog” for us. He wanted a dog that could hunt a bunch of stuff, and one that would be a good family dog, and one that wouldn’t necessarily harass any livestock we might get, and well, about a dozen other things that would make it “the perfect dog” for our family.

While I thought he was going to stand a better chance of bringing home a unicorn, he managed to land on the Airedale Terrier, a versatile, “do it all” breed. And, after almost two and a half years of living with one, I can vouch for their abilities. However, there are two caveats that need to go along with their abilities: 1. They must be trained well-to-do what you want them to when you want them to and 2. Although they are prized for their ability to think independently and respond accordingly, this can be a real problem when you’re trying to train them well. It’s a vicious circle.

Steve was all in. From the moment he and Duncan met, when Dunc came running into the room directly to him, with a small stuffed duck in his mouth, Steve was about doing everything these dogs need to do to be the animal you want them to be. We frequently frustrated him, rewarding bad behavior (because puppies are just so darn cute, how can you resist?), confusing him by being consistent one day, and lax the next, and a whole bunch of other things that caused plenty of hiccups in Dunc’s training regimen.

However, Steve powered through, and the two of them were well on their way to becoming a dynamic hunting team.

Things were going so well that we decided the only thing better than one Airedale was two Airedales, and about a year ago, we brought Henson home with us after attending a national Airedale hunt test and training event in Ohio. Hens had a very different temperament than Dunc, in addition to being a silly puppy, and Steve spent a lot of time rolling his eyes at the shenanigans that the little guy got up to, especially when they involved aggravating his big dog brother, but we all agreed Hens was a welcome addition to the family.

Then, fate intervened, and I was left with two high maintenance dogs that I was woefully unprepared to deal with. I’ve chronicled the grief process that Duncan went through, and I’ve come to realize that he wasn’t only grieving Steve, but he was grieving his way of life that stopped in that split second. All the field work and training he’d been doing on a regular basis, which kept his hyperactive mind and prey drive focused and pointed in the right direction ended abruptly, and he was lost. Henson, mercifully, didn’t know what he was missing, but as the months dragged on, I knew that playing fetch with a tennis ball wasn’t going to keep him satisfied for much longer.

Dunc was way out of my league, and for me to try to train him or work with him would have only led to more frustration and tension between us, something that we’ve only recently begun to overcome. However, Hens was a relatively blank slate, as was I, and even though I’d never wanted to do it before, I suddenly started thinking about learning how to train a dog. And, I don’t mean the simple obedience: come, sit, stay. I mean training to do the field work that he’d have been doing if Steve was still here. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that Hens and I could learn together, and maybe someday, I would catch up to where Dunc was.

So, this past weekend, Hens and I packed up and headed out to Ohio again for the Hunting Working Airedale Nationals event, which thankfully, this year, was jam packed full of training seminars from beginner puppy right on up through advanced field work.

Before the weekend started, I had to be honest: I’d never wanted to get into this in the first place. I was happy to have pets in the house while Steve was happy to have finely tuned hunting machines in the field. Also, I don’t hunt, and don’t intend to ever hunt. (The good news there is that you can handle dogs for other people who do hunt, so this isn’t a complete waste of time.)

Finally, there was a good chance that this just wasn’t going to work out. Maybe Hens had been allowed to be lazy for too long. Maybe I would not understand or enjoy the process of training him enough to be able to commit to following it through. So many maybes, so much anxiety, so much fear of failure, for both me and my good boy, Hens, not to mention the constant neon sign flashing in my head, “Steve should be here, not you.”

Fast forward through a very long, physically and emotionally exhausting weekend, to cut to the chase: Hens and I had a wonderful weekend together. I learned some of the most basic training techniques, and he responded exceptionally well to all of it.

We did everything from teach him how to walk on a leash without pulling my arm off to letting him chase his first live birds, which he instinctively knew how to do. Seeing the light in his eyes, and the joy that having a purpose brought to him made all of it worthwhile, and something that I want to do more of with him in the future.

I love dogs, and I’ve had one almost all my life, and I know many dogs are happy being people pups, and house pets. If I had been the one getting a dog for our family on my own, we would have found a rescue that seemed like a happy puppy fit for our family. But we didn’t.

We got these crazy, stubborn, smart, working dogs that need to do their job to be happy. I’m sad now that I didn’t share these dogs in this way with Steve while he was here but starting to follow in his footsteps is an incredible way to keep him with me, as well as develop new connections with these incredible animals.