Children’s Book Brings Love Of Girl And Her Service Dog To Life BY AMANDA ROBERGE, ILLUSTRATION COURTESY OF SCOTT MAGOON
Here’s how the lyrics go: A dog’s best friend is a man who appreciates a dog who appreciates a man. If we change the “man” to “woman,” and you can imagine me in my black hatchback barreling up Route 190 toward home, you’d also have to imagine me hearing the song on the oldies station of my car and immediately thinking of Rescue. Maybe forever, as someone who loves old tunes, cute dogs and great children’s books, songs like that will always make me think of Rescue.
R
escue is a black lab who appreciates Jessica Kensky. He appreciates her primarily because she -- along with her husband Patrick Downes, of course -- is the mainline to the two things dogs love most: treats and affection. But the truth is that he has been bred to love her with treats and cuddles notwithstanding, and that was the thing that someone like Jessica needed most when she found him. Their story is now the backdrop for a beautiful children’s book entitled Rescue & Jessica: A Life-Changing Friendship, penned by the couple, which is being released this month through Candlewick Press. Both Jessica and Patrick are amputees who survived the Boston Marathon bombings -- having swung by the race that day in 2013 on a whim to 42 APRIL2018
check out the runners and lend some cheers. That violent misfortune led to Jessica losing one leg, and then the other, after what seemed like endless complications from her initial injury. Patrick also lost one of his legs in the tragic event. The two were newlyweds, having been married only a year before the bombings. While Patrick recovered relatively quickly, Jessica spent nearly four years at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, and only returned to their Cambridge home last summer with a new best friend in tow. That new best friend, incidentally, was named Dog of the Year by the ASPCA. Rescue, named for Worcester Firefighter John Davies, who passed away in 2011 in the line of duty and commandeered the truck known as
“Rescue 1,” is a service dog trained through the NEADS (National Education for Assistance Dogs Services) program based in Princeton, Mass. His purpose was -- and is -- to support Jessica emotionally and physically, as she navigates a new life with a whole new idea of what she is capable of. And if Rescue was able to help her recover some small pieces of her former self, writing this children’s book has gone some way toward recovering the rest. The journey to writing a children’s book came through the couple’s good friend, Clelia Gore, who works at Candlewick Press as a book agent and encouraged Jessica and Patrick to get started on sharing their story. Sharing their story, it turns out, has been a cathartic and healing experience and one that plays right into their strengths as