Far From Home

Far From Home... more

by Rick Mcclelland

Original - Sold

Price

$500

Dimensions

16.000 x 20.000 x 0.375 inches

Title

Far From Home

Artist

Rick Mcclelland

Medium

Painting - Acrylic On Canvas

Description

Far From Home

Some, very good, friends of mine gave me a German Shepherd puppy when I was fifteen years old. I named him Major and he and I were inseparable. Everywhere I went I would take Major, if I could. He was the smartest and most loyal dog I have ever known.
I joined the service in November of 1975. I hated to leave Major behind and I'm sure he hated to see me leave but I had decided it was what I needed to do at that point in my life. I spent a couple months in boot camp at Fort Leonardwood Missouri and then almost three months of advanced training down at Fort Sill Oklahoma which is where I was to be stationed for my permanent assignment. I had been prepared for all the discipline and hard work that I received while training but I wasn't ready for all the confusion and lack of professionalism that was the nature of my permanent assignment. This unit was not at all what I had expected. It was the first battalion of the thirtieth field artillery unit and it seemed like all we would do is hurry to get from point A to point B and then sit and wait for someone to decide what we should do next. All too often we would wait for hours at a time. Well about a month or so into it, I learned my entire unit was being relocated to Germany and I decided that all this bull crap wasn't what I had signed up for so I went to my first sergeant and told him I wanted out of the service. He told me, the only way that's going to happen is if I start screwing up. Then he turned around and suggested I take a couple weeks vacation to get my head straight. Well that sounded like a good idea. I figured I could go home, maybe buy a car and bring Major back with me. So that's what I did. I came home on leave for 2 weeks and stayed at mom's house. First thing I did was to go get Major at Pat's house, boy was he happy to see me. Pat was heartbroken to see Major go, she had been watching him ever since I had left for the service. The next thing I had to do was find a car and some money to buy it with. I found a 68 Cutlass Oldsmobile. It wasn't perfect, it had a big indent in the trunk and rear bumper but it ran really well and it had a current inspection sticker. The cost was two hundred and fifty dollars and I talked mom into cosigning a loan for me. I think by the time I bought the car I only had five more days before Major and I had to leave for Oklahoma. I was actually anxious to get on the road, back to Fort Sill, with my best friend and our new car. I was thinking now that I had a car and Major, I could deal with whatever the army threw at me. So the day came for us to say our goodbyes. First of all we had to say goodbye to our friends and family. Everyone kept repeating the same things over and over again, make sure you're careful , if you get tired pull over. My response was the same each time, we'll be fine, don't worry.
The time came, Major and I loaded up the car and off we went on our journey. By the time we reached interstate 70, down around Columbus Ohio, Major was feeling pretty bored and was trying to sleep in the back seat. It was early in the day and I was still doing pretty good as far as driving goes. Sometime, before we got through Ohio, the car started overheating. I got off the highway, pulled into a gas station and popped the hood. The car had some steam coming out from under the hood so I took Major for a short walk, while the engine cooled and so he could do his business. Then I put him back in the car so I could do my business. Ok, now that we had gotten that out of the way it was time to check out the car. It turns out the only problem was that a radiator hose clamp was loose. So I borrowed a screw driver, tightened up the clamp, grabbed a couple snacks for he and I, hopped back in the car and off we went to get back on the highway. Major always got excited when we'd start a new trip. Every time he got in the car he figured it was a new trip and so off we went. We were midway through Illinois when I started to get hungry and Major was completely bored to death so I decided to stop for some lunch. We stopped at a little restaurant alongside the highway. After taking Major out to stretch a bit, I went into the restaurant to get something to eat. I decided on a T-bone steak with a baked potato and a veggie. When I was done I asked for a doggy bag, no pun intended even though it was for my dog. I took the leftover steak and the bone out to Major and off we went to get back on the road. It wasn't too far down the road when I started feeling a bit tired. I should have known better than to eat a big meal like that but my appetite got the best of me. I knew I had to find a rest area fast when my eyes started closing against my will. Major was in the back seat still gnawing on the T-bone and completely unaware of me getting tired. He had no clue that I was about to turn our whole world upside down, literally.
We couldn't have driven more than twenty miles from that restaurant when I started to nod off. We were somewhere near Altamont Illinois and the last thing I can remember thinking was that I needed to find a rest area fast but it was too late and out I went. The next thing I can remember was snapping out of a dream where I had been flying over a field, some of which was on fire. I woke up to reality and horror. I had no idea where I was, where Major was or even what had happened to us. The first thing I did was scream for help. I heard someone close by yell "He's still alive!" Those three words were a huge relief because I, honestly, didn't know if I were dead or alive. I was pinned in the car with my head buried deep into the roof and the steering wheel in my left eye. I was upside down and unable to free myself. I was desperate to know how and where Major was. I thought it was night time but I found out later that it was 1:00 in the afternoon. Someone came to me to try to get me out. I believe it was a state trooper but I don't know for sure. I remember through this whole ordeal asking, where's my dog and I kept getting the same reply, he's in the car but not moving. The person that was trying to help me grabbed the steering wheel and with my help, not knowing my collar bone was broken, attempted to pull it out of my face. I felt it give a tiny bit and tried to pull my head out from under and then he gave up, telling me it's not budging. It felt like a ton of bricks coming back down on my face and head as he let go of that wheel. I tried telling him that the steering wheel had moved a little but he didn't hear me or maybe he knew it wasn't going to move enough. Next I heard someone telling me that they were going to lift the back of the car. I also heard someone say “be careful because there was gas all over the place.” I was scared for myself but more so for Major. I kept asking how he was and they kept telling me he wasn't moving. After, what seemed like forever, they were able to push the roof down and pull me free from the car. I remember them laying me on the ground or maybe on a stretcher, again I asked "How's my dog?” Finally someone told me, they had gotten him out of the car. Then they said he was up on his feet. I was extremely relieved to hear that he was alive. I tried to whistle and call for him but I was unable to whistle and my calls were either too weak or not loud enough for him to hear. I passed out again right after hearing he was okay. The next thing I remember was waking up in the hospital as I was throwing nurses off of me and screaming that, it, whatever they were trying to jam into my private parts, wouldn't go. Then I was out again. I found out that I was first taken to a local hospital in Effingham Illinois and then airlifted by helicopter to Springfield Illinois; I don't remember any of that. I woke up the next day in a hospital bed with a whole bunch of questions. First and foremost, I wanted to know what happened to my dog. The doctors and nurses had no idea what happened to him. Then I got a phone call as I lay in my bed, still in a lot of pain. It was an Illinois state police officer. He wanted to ask me about my dog. He had seen my uniform or my Army ID and thought Major might be an army attack dog. "Army attack dog?" "No!" "He's just my pet!" I was afraid they were thinking he was dangerous and wanted to put him down. He then asked what his name was and if I was going to have someone come and get him. The thought crossed my mind to get up out of the hospital bed but I was too weak and had no ride. He said he knew where Major was but he couldn't guarantee that he would still be there when someone came to get him. When I got off the phone with the officer, I immediately called home. I think I spoke to my mom. I remember I was fighting back tears when I told her that I needed someone to go get Major. She told me, she thought my little brother Danny and my cousin Pat were talking about going to get him.
For the second time in my life I was in the hospital for the Easter holiday. There was an older man in the bed next to me; his wife brought me an Easter basket for the holiday. It was heartwarming to me that these two people, who barely knew me at all, were kind enough to think of me for the holiday. I was all bandaged up and in a lot of pain but between the nurses, my roommate and his wife, I was comfortable. Still I was sad and fearful of what Major might be going through and how he was doing health wise. I wondered how Danny and Pat would find him. He was alone, didn't know a soul and had no idea where he was. On top of that, I thought, he could be hurt.
Four days had passed since the accident. The army had been telling my family that they were going to fly me to Walter Reed Hospital in Washington DC but I wasn't hearing anything about my dog. Finally a nurse came in to tell me I had visitors. I wasn't sure who it was but I was hoping it was Danny and Pat. Imagine my joy when I saw their faces walk into my room. I'm sure my bruised, swollen face lit up as they came in. Their faces were apprehensive as they stretched their necks around the doorway. I'm guessing they were afraid of what they were going to see. I couldn't wait to hear about Major. They knew that, even without me asking. They had already talked to the nurses about putting me in a wheelchair so they could take me outside to see him. As the nurses got me into the wheel chair, Danny and Pat headed out to Pat's car to get Major. I was anxious but scared that he wouldn't recognize me as I was all black and blue, bandages around my head, swollen and I had stitches on my head and face. I looked like Frankenstein. They took me down to the service entrance where Pat had Major waiting for me. At first he didn't recognize me and was just happy to be out of the car and with his family. Major was cautious and started barking at the sight of this stranger in the wheelchair. Then he heard my voice and caught my scent. “Woe!” He was all over me; he jumped on my lap with his front paws, his tail moving a mile a minute. He was trying to lick my face as I gave him as big of a hug as I could muster. Danny saw I was in pain so he pulled Major back off from my lap. He and I had to settle for me just petting and scratching him. I loved seeing my brother and cousin but nothing could have made me feel better than I did at that moment, seeing and touching my best friend in the entire world. Pat would later say it was a beautiful reunion between a man and his dog and that it brought tears to her eyes. After our reunion Pat and Danny told me about what they heard from the state trooper when they got to Altamont.
The trooper had told them about the accident and what they believe happened. He said the car had hit a guardrail, cutting through the engine block and flipping the car onto it's roof. We then slid underneath an overpass leaving tire marks on the underside of the bridge as the car slid on it's roof. When we exited the opposite side of that overpass the car began to role. The trooper thought my head may have gone through the windshield a time or two and he suggested that not wearing a seatbelt, in this case, might have saved my life. He believed that wearing a seatbelt might have cost me my head because it could have held me upright in the seat. By the time the car came to a stop it was a crinkled up mess and Major and I should have been dead. Pat says it was a miracle that we lived. She recalled standing over the wrecked car and wondering how we survived in, what couldn't have been, more than two square feet of space left inside that car. All of the windows were gone and the roof had been smashed all the way down to the seats. The trooper told them, when they got Major out of the car he was pretty scared and took off running. He cleared a five foot fence just to get away from all that chaos. I guess that jump training when he was younger finally payed off. I don't know how the State Troopers found him but they did, in a KOA campground. Thankfully, the State Troopers were thoughtful and cared enough to want to help Major. The Trooper told them, if Major didn't join the wild dogs, they would probably kill him. The officer told them that he had been checking on Major every day and the campers had been leaving food for him. Major would not let anyone close to him but he would eat the food after they walked away. As my cousin Pat put it; Major did not give his trust easily.
Danny and Pat followed the trooper to the KOA where they saw Major lying on my clothes. Pat yelled out to him. Major, I imagined, was never so happy to see and hear someone as he was when he saw them. He ran like the wind to get to them. First he jumped into the car, then jumped back out and went to Danny and Pat, jumping all over them, obviously happy to see them, then he went to the Trooper and started nudging his hand with his tail wagging like crazy. He suddenly loved the trooper. The trooper pet him and laughed. He said, "oh yeah, now you want to be friends." After a bit, they put him into the car and headed to Springfield to see me. Major sat in the back seat with Danny. He cuddled, nuzzled and slept. He was the only one in the car who was well rested when they got to Springfield. Major picked up a lot of tics and his hip was bruised. He faired pretty well through our ordeal. Danny picked up a few tics too, from Major but he and Pat had a good laugh about that later. I never had the opportunity to thank the troopers but I am forever grateful for their time and their kind hearts.
I was just recently put into contact, with another State Trooper, who remembers the accident, thanks to the hard investigative work of a couple awesome female officers from the Illinois State Police Department. He told them, he doesn't remember people too well but he never forgets a dog. He wasn't at the accident scene but he remembers Major. He remembers hearing all the chatter on the police radio. He remembers that the accident sounded pretty bad but he was assigned to a different patrol in another area at that time. He had put the accident out of his mind but just as he was preparing to go off duty he heard other officers talking about a dog who had run from my vehicle into a grassy area south of Interstate 70. There was a camp area near there with a few campers on the site and he lived only about a mile from there. He was afraid these campers, if they heard about my dog, would try to catch him. He figured, if Major was like his dog, he would run away from anyone trying to catch him. The Trooper couldn't remember if it was him who retrieved my clothes from my vehicle or someone else but one of them put the clothes in the last area that Major had been seen. They were hoping Major would smell me on the clothes and wait for me there. It worked! He then contacted the people in the campground and asked them not to try catching the dog because he might run away and then they may never find him again. From then on, the Trooper checked on Major several times a day, for the next four days, leaving food and water for him as well. The Trooper was concerned that Major wouldn't eat but there were several ponds around so he would have plenty of water. Each time he went to check on him, Major would peek out from around the brush but he wouldn't approach the trooper. If the trooper stepped forward Major would back up preparing to run. He told me, he remembered that Major was a beautiful German Shepherd, was mostly black and he could tell, even then, that major was faithful and very attached to me. The trooper told me that he was confident, Major would stay with my clothes but he was afraid that if I were gone too long, my scent would dissipate and Major would leave. Fortunately, he said, my people got there in time to reunite with him. He was again on a different assignment so he missed the reunion but he imagined that Major was very excited to see them and I have no doubt that he was. I wish this trooper could have been there for the reunion, I’m sure Major would have been nudging his hand also, in an effort to say Thank You.

For the past forty three years I've wanted to and felt I owed, the Illinois State Trooper that helped Major and I, a huge, Thank You! Now I have learned that I owe more than one of them. I'm sure there were many people helping Major and I at the scene of that accident and many more helping me at Saint John's Hospital in Springfield Illinois. If I knew who they all were I would try to personally thank all of them but, truth be told, the troopers who helped Major and watched over him, did more for me than anyone else ever could have.
I don't know if they know it or not, but the Illinois State Troopers that helped Major and I, along with my cousin and my younger brother are forever heroes as far as I am concerned.

Pat, Danny and Major headed out for their trip back home. I was sad to see them go but happy and took comfort in knowing that Major would be okay.

Uploaded

December 23rd, 2019