Weekly Meeting

26 July 2018 Up close and personal with Emett – Terry Rodgers

A cheque presentation was made to Graham Allen, Chair of the Belvoir Wassailers for all their Charity work and entertainment in the Vale. Gerry also received a £200 cheque for The Memory Café from the priest in Cotgrave, in appreciation of all the valuable work done by Gerry & her team.

On to our main speaker, Terry who is blind and he gave us an insight into what that is like and in particular, with regard to his faithful guide dog Emett, an eight year old male black Labrador retriever cross. Emett is named after Rowland Emett who designed and built the famous water clock in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham. There are 5000 Guide dogs in the UK, all bred at Leamington Spa, but trained at 5 Training Centres around the UK and costing about £60k each to train. There are ‘puppy walkers’ used to do some of the early training to get the puppies used to the urban environment with noises, people and traffic that they will have to work in. The guide dogs are trained to go to the toilet on command, as well as eating on command; they have to know the difference between ‘left’ and ‘right’.  Even after getting the ‘phone call’ to say he would be getting a guide dog, it was trained by his handlers in Nottingham, then Radcliffe, where Terry lives, so that Emett was familiar with the surroundings he would be working in, followed by 2 weeks where they both stayed in a Hotel in Nottingham, for further ‘bonding’!

Emett never barks, he may snore or make noises when asleep, but they walk together about 3 or 4 miles per day and has been on 5 cruises with Terry and his wife. Terry speaks to a number of clubs and organisations as an ambassador for Guide Dogs for the Blind, whilst having limited sight has many drawbacks, other than the obvious, the one advantage in Terry’s case is that it has brought Emett into his life for some six years now and it is obvious that both parties enjoy each other’s company very much. Guide dogs tend to be retired after 6 to 8 years, so Terry is hoping his wife can have him as a pet and he can be trained again for a new guide dog.

What an inspiring talk and President Trevor presented Terry with a cheque, which will go to the Guide Dogs Association.

DE/AR