I had heard a lot about Marley before ever meeting him. I was in a long-distance relationship, and my girlfriend would regale me with stories of the fantastic adventures Marley and his likely reluctant co-conspirator, Koda, would go on after escaping from a perfectly good backyard. Marley, a large loveable Golden Retriever, and Koda, a black Lab mix, lived in a nice home in a Charlotte suburb.

Like most Golden’s, Marley did not believe there was such a thing as being to close to his humans and would stand on his hind lakes and wrap you in a hug that looked like you were going to take a spin on the dance floor. Or, if you were sitting, he would try to become a 100-pound lap dog. Marley had a crooked nose, and when he looked at me, I was reminded of one of those characters in the movies who played a hustler or bookie, with a Fedora hat, chewing on an unlit cigar.

I came into the relationship with the suspicion that he was intelligent from everything he had been able to accomplish during his bouts of unrestrained freedom after escaping. On a couple of occasions, he had covered multiple miles and would have navigated some busy thoroughfares. In addition to looking out for himself, he had Koda to look out for as well.

I did not realize it when we first met, but soon I would be locked into a battle of wits and wills with this formidable opponent. As a man trying to impress his girlfriend, I may have mentioned a certain familiarity with tools and a rudimentary knowledge of building and fixing things. My girlfriend was smart; she didn’t ask me to fix anything but made a point of telling me what was wrong. When I didn’t take the bait, she then said,  “can you think of anything we could do to keep Marley from escaping?” Having never owned a dog, I was unfamiliar with the energy and tenacity dogs exhibit when feeling constrained inside a lush shady backyard.

The challenge, now verbalized, put me into a no-win situation. The gauntlet had been thrown down, and I would have to take on this slippery escape artist. I was familiar with Escape from Alcatraz and knew Marley, like Clint Eastwood, had plenty of time each day for planning, so I would need to be one step ahead.

When assessing the yard for the first time, it was painfully obvious where the weakness lie and the cure, as simple as a couple of cement cinder blocks. Once I had the blocks in place, I assured my girlfriend of the futility of any future attempts by the pair to escape. She didn’t look as confident, but took a wait and see approach.

I had overlooked the possibility of other dogs roaming free and taunting our jailbirds in the process. The cinder blocks proved to be no match for Marley, and the pair fashioned a workaround in a matter of days. Now a new ingredient called pride was involved and the fact that an intelligent Golden Retriever was not going to outsmart the boyfriend.

Walking into their domain and after being smothered by the two for petting attention, I walked the complete perimeter of the fence looking for the weak points. I could tell Marley was watching me, and I believe I detected a bit of smugness in his crooked nose smile. Later talking with my girlfriend, she casually mentioned she had some components for putting up an electric fence. I immediately had visions of wire stretching for miles, and instinctively knew it would involve a lot of work.

The fence definitely had merit, there was way too much perimeter to protect with obstacles. After consulting the internet on installation, I took the components my girlfriend had and purchased two large bags of insulators.

On the install, I tried to keep the wire as close to the ground as possible so that digging underneath would not be an option. Once I had the bright yellow insulators installed, and the wire stretching between them, I watched Marley walk the perimeter looking at the new fortifications. It reminded me of Jurassic Park and how the Velociraptor’s looked for weaknesses in the fence line. Koda, less interested, stayed more to the center of the yard, letting Marley do his reconnaissance.

I was worried about one section where the terrain took a sudden dip in the middle of one fence section, and that dip could provide a bit of an opening in an otherwise secure perimeter. I was not overly concerned because it would only allow access into the neighbor’s yard, which was also fenced.

The next day when my girlfriend returned from work, she found the two in the neighbor’s yard. I wouldn’t say at this point that the two were taunting me, but they were surely talking behind my back.

This time when I went into the yard, I had my bag of insulators, a roll of wire, a hammer, and my determination. Both dogs watched as I turned the breach into something more resembling a power grid. Wires wound around insulators and switched back until the final wire was only two inches from the earth. Marley acting nonchalant, waited until I finished before checking it out for himself.

Marley and Koda, were finally contained, and protected from crossing dangerous roads and getting into other mischief on far-flung adventures. The two had a knack for finding well to do homes or farms to be voluntarily captured and where the occupants treated them like prodigal sons. One time when visiting my house in West Columbia, a gate was accidentally left open, and they went on an adventure that ended with the two getting a ride home in a police cruiser. When the cruiser pulled into the driveway, the two were sitting straight up in the backseat like a couple of passengers in a police Uber enjoying the scenery and happy to be home for dinner.

Both Marley and Koda have now passed on, but their unconditional love, unique personalities, and adventurous spirit lives on in our memories.