Pastis and the Wedding Pond

Pastis believes that every pond, puddle and sea wave in Hua Hin is a personal invitation. I know this, I have known this since the day I brought him home, and yet I made the mistake of saying yes when a friend invited us to a small garden wedding at a boutique hotel near the beach.

The invitation said that dogs were welcome on a lead, and I planned everything. We took our usual six o'clock beach walk first, so that Pastis would be tired. I brushed his black coat until it shone, and I even found him a navy bow tie, which he wore with a face of deep suffering. The ceremony was at five in the afternoon, under frangipani trees, with white chairs on the lawn and a small pond covered in lotus leaves at the back of the garden. I should have looked at that pond more carefully.

Everything was perfect for twenty minutes. The bride walked down the path, Pastis sat quietly next to my chair, and I was so proud I almost cried. Then a frog, the size of a coin, jumped out of the grass and into the water. Pastis looked at the frog. He looked at me. And with the leap of a champion, he pulled the lead out of my hand and flew into the pond.

The sound of a thirty-kilo Labrador landing in water in a quiet garden is something I will hear for the rest of my life. A fountain of green water went up, the lotus leaves flew, and a very kind uncle in the second row got a free shower. Pastis, covered in leaves, swam in a big happy circle with a lotus flower on his head and then climbed out and shook himself on the guests.

I apologised to everyone. And then something nice happened: the bride, who turned out to be a dog person, started laughing, and said that this was the best photo of the day. The photographer agreed. They took the wedding photos again with Pastis, still wet, sitting in the middle.

The hotel staff gave us towels and, I think, forgave us. I walked home with a wet dog, a lost bow tie and a bag of leftover chicken satay. I also washed him carefully the next day and checked his ears, as our vet advised after any pond swim. And yes, I will take him to another wedding. But first I will check the garden for water.