Experience a sad, funny, heartwarming tale told by Columnist Sheila Clancy. It portrays a canine’s ability to heal, or sometimes break, our wounded hearts. Read it and you’ll cry, laugh, smile, or maybe all three. Reprinted by permission from “The Lighter Side” by columnist Sheila Clancy, originally published in “The Saratoga Special”, on Friday, August 19, 2005.
Download “Lost Puppy for a Lost Woman”
September 24, 2004. On what would have been our 10th wedding anniversary, my husband and I signed our separation agreement. Gulp.
Four hours later I was in Pennsylvania meeting the newest addition to our family, a 9-week-old yellow Labrador puppy. Gulp again.
During the drive I thought of a joke I had just read:
Sally was driving home from one of her business trips in northern Arizona when she saw an elderly Navajo woman walking on the side of the road. As the trip was a long and quiet one, she stopped the car and asked the Navajo woman if she would like a ride. With a silent nod of thanks, the woman got into the car. Resuming the journey, Sally tried in vain to make a bit of small talk with the Navajo woman. The old woman just sat silently, looking intently at everything she saw, studying every little detail, until she noticed a brown bag on the seat next to Sally. “What in Bag?” asked the old woman. Sally looked down at the brown bag and said. “It’s a bottle of wine. I got it for my husband.”
The Navajo woman was silent for another moment or two. Then speaking with the quiet wisdom of an elder, she said, “Good trade.”
I could only hope mine was too.
It goes without saying that was quite possibly the craziest decision I had ever made (getting the puppy that is, though at the time both decisions seemed questionable), but I had promised the kids long before I knew the separation was imminent, and you can’t renege on a promise to a child.
And then we met him: all12, soft, fluffy, sweet, energetic pounds of him. It was love at first sight (hope it was the same for him). How could it not be a good trade? I have to say he saved me. There are never enough hours in the day for me, but last fall there were far too many of them and I needed every diversion I could find to keep my heart and mind from fixating on the dissolution of my family.
Enter Wags the dog. My dad orchestrated the adoption and gave him as an early Christmas gift to the children; though I’m sure he probably sensed I needed him more at that moment than the kids ever would. He needed to be fed three times a day and let out every few hours and watched, tussled, patted and loved all day long. My constant companions had been fear, doubt and loneliness. He proved to be far better for my health and kept me company while the kids were in school.
He rode in the car with us in the morning and looked back at their empty car seats and whined after they left. “I’m with you pal,” I thought. My heart still lurches every time I drop them off and wonder how their teacher, a virtual stranger, will ever know them, love them, teach them, challenge them and protect them like I would. Hmmm. Wonder what Wags’ mother thought when we took him? Probably a different mindset when you have a whole litter: one down, five to go.
Fast forward about seven months. I was without my children and my weekend stretched out quietly in front of me when I decided to clean the house. And I mean clean the house – dust everything, move furniture, wash linens, clean out rain gutters, scrub appliances, ceiling fans and every nook and cranny that usually gets overlooked. I left the back door to the deck open so the dog could run in and out, and he did every 15 minutes or so.
They suddenly I realized it had been a while since I’d felt his cold nose on the back of my leg. I went outside and called him. He didn’t bound out from under the boxwood bushes. There was no familiar jingle of tags. No noise at all. I checked the neighbors’ yard (he has been known to sneak through a tiny gap in the fence dividing our yards), no sign of him.
I circled the neighborhood. Nothing. I drove the route we walk together every day. Nothing. I went home, and decided he would come back on his own at dinner. He didn’t.
Then I thought, “well, when it gets dark he’ll come home.” He didn’t.
Then I fell apart. And I mean full-blown hysterical-crying, sobbing fell apart. I gathered all my strength and called my dad and managed to eke out “I lost the dog.”
He was quiet and in the voice I’ve only heard three times in my life (when the space shuttle Challenger exploded, when my grandmother died, and last August when I called him in Saratoga to tell him I was getting divorced) he said “Well he either was hit by a car or someone took him. All you can do is hope for the latter and hope they’re good to him.”
I was incapable of speech and roamed the neighborhood every few hours all night long looking for him. I called my friend and amid sobs told her I’d lost Wags. She was at my house in seven minutes and said, “Good Lord Sheila; I knew you were a wreck. You didn’t cry like this when Brian left.” Her family had color photos printed at Kinko’s and were canvassing the area within half an hour.
I on the other hand was useless, listless and couldn’t stop crying. How is it possible that my marriage crumbles and I am Even Steven, but the dog disappears and I cannot function? I finally made a few phone calls to neighbors asking them to keep an eye out for him. Five minutes later my neighbors’ Suburban came careening in my drive-way, gravel flying, and she jumped out of the car cell phone in hand and practically threw it at me. “Here,” she said. “Talk to my friend Paige.”
Her friend turned out to be my friend too, who lived in a house not far form us, but across a very busy street. She said Wags “found” them at the elementary-school playground and followed them home. He had dinner and slept in their daughter’s bed.
Glad he had fun. I had the urge to hug him and strangle him at the same time.
I flew over to their house, ran to the door and was greeted by a huge, old yellow Lab. (Keep in mind mine is a small not yet 1-year-old.) I lost it and sobbed like I’ve never sobbed before,
Then I heard laughing and felt a hand on my shoulder. “He’s ours,” my friend said. “Your dog is in the backyard.”
I sprinted back there and fell on him in a heap of relief and sheer joy, and can’t remember ever being as happy to see anyone in my life.
Definitely a good trade.
