Whether on two wheels or two feet, I like to stray far from the beaten path—to explore hidden places and follow the gravel lanes that branch off from unsignposted town roads. I track wild creatures through hawthorn thickets and scratchy spruce hells, and I watch them from hastily improvised hides on the shores of lonely ponds. Sometimes these excursions leave me standing in driving rain for hours. At other times, they require that I trudge through seemingly bottomless mires. In any case, carrying unprotected ID isn’t always practical. Moreover, I don’t fancy dropping my driver’s license and other documents in the ooze at the bottom of a beaver pond. Of course, I could seal my ID in a ziplock bag, but that would only keep the contents dry; it wouldn’t prevent loss. Which explains why I often leave my wallet at home. Still, I don’t like the idea of being anonymous. What if a windfall or crumbling ice cornice were to knock me unconscious? What if a distracted driver crashes into me and leaves me sprawled unconscious on the highway? How would any passerby know who I was? And how would they contact family?

While such eventualities don’t make for happy reading, they can and do happen. Every day. When a dog ran under Farwell’s front wheel some years back, the crash sent him over the bars at 20 mph and left him lying unconscious in the middle of the road. It was some minutes before he came to his senses. Long enough for the dog’s owner to spirit his (uninjured) pet away, in fact—but not, curiously, quite long enough for him to call an ambulance. To make matters worse, when Farwell finally came to, he couldn’t remember who he was, let alone how he’d come to be standing in the middle of a county road next to a broken bike, with a mouthful of shattered teeth and a haze of blood dimming the vision in his only good eye. Luckily, he rallied quickly. He had a cell phone in his bar bag, and—miracle of miracles—he was just inside a coverage area. So his story ended more or less happily. But it could easily have gone the other way.

So I like to carry something that identifies me and gives any first responder enough information to guide my immediate treatment. But how best to carry it? That’s the question. At first, I considered an identity bracelet, but I don’t like wearing anything on my wrist besides a watch. Many runners and cyclists buy Road ID tags and strap them around their ankles, but my aversion to bracelets extends to all my extremities. Moreover, paying USD20 (or more) for what amounts to a tag on a strap didn’t really appeal. Then I hit on something that should have been obvious from the outset: the dog tag. It was, after all, the original all-but-indestructible ID.

The rest was easy. A Web search quickly led me to DogTagsOnline, a business which—surprise!—does nothing but make custom dog tags. Ten bucks got me a pair of the sturdy metal rectangles, two breakaway chains (one long and one short), and a couple of rubber silencers. Standard shipping had the whole package on my doorstep in four days. I now wear one tag around my neck whenever I head out the door. The other gets clipped to my bar bag or key ring. Peace of mind seldom comes so cheap.

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