“Gramma, Gramma, come here. Quick!”
I hightailed it to the door where my two excited grandsons asked “Gramma, do you know this dog?”
“Hmm, I said, No, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him.”
Standing on the front lawn was a skittish taupe-colored dog with his head hung low. He was young, around a year old, and big – probably a Staffordshire Terrier mixed with an even bigger breed with a wrinkled head – and the size of his feet foretold that he still had some growing to do. Not surprisingly, he was not wearing a collar and his long pink tongue hung out.
“He needs water,” I said before heading to the kitchen to get him a bowl. After he drank, I left him at the door while I went to get a leash. By the time I returned, he had vanished. My plan to walk him along the bordering streets in search of his home, one I wasn’t sure he had nearby by the way he carried himself, was dashed. I could only pray that he’d make it back on his own or that I’d see him again.
There He Is!
That sighting would occur as soon as I hoped. On my evening walk with Teddy, I spotted him halfway up the road in a neighbor’s yard eating a pile of kibble off the ground. “I see you found a friend. He was at my house earlier today,” I said after introducing myself. Ernesto explained that the dog showed up a couple of hours ago. He had already filled up on water and was now gobbling up his dinner. Despite the fact that his seven-year-old nephew was crying to keep him, his parents refused because they already had a three-pack of pit bulls. Besides, we still hadn’t given up hope that he had a family anxiously awaiting his homecoming. Together, we followed a tip from another neighbor that had seen the dog at a house one block over. Unfortunately, when we arrived at his supposed home, we learned that they had a brown dog all right, one of three, but it wasn’t him.
Ernesto and his family decided to shelter him overnight in their garage. The next morning, I rode my bicycle up and down the local streets looking for missing dog posters and asking if anyone knew where he belonged. No luck. My worry grew when I checked in on him at the end of my ride. He had disappeared from his blanket on the back porch sometime during the night. Again, I offered a silent prayer that he returned safely to his home.
Are You Home? Or Not Home?
That evening, it looked like my prayer had been answered with a yes. As Ted and I strolled along, there he was, sitting alone in an enclosed yard. But my happiness at seeing him waned when his expression and body language told me that he felt sad and wanted out. His body shook as he put his nose to the fence to touch my hand, “What’s the matter,” I asked, “Why aren’t you happy to be home? Are you afraid of me?”
Although I thought it strange how he sat unmoving at the edge of the horse arena where I had never seen him, or any dogs, alone before, I had seen the people out there with their horses and a dog that could’ve been him. All looked well cared for. I tried to quiet the inner voice telling me something wasn’t quite right and to be glad he was home, but I couldn’t. Why was he out there alone looking miserable? Was he new to their home and confused? Did someone else find him nearby and put him there for safekeeping?
My intuition proved correct. The next evening, on yet another walk heading in the opposite direction, I caught sight of the same dog laying in a wash on the side of the road. Not good on such a hot, sunny day. “Come here, boy,” I called. He got up, cowering as he came near. I offered the back of my hand and spoke softly, “It’s alright. Good boy. Did you get out again? Walk with us.” He relaxed and stayed at my side all the way up that road and down our street, stopping only to relieve himself, running ahead only to say hello to Ernesto and his family. I updated them about his home and borrowed a collar and leash to be sure to get him there.
After stopping at our place for two bowls of water, we walked two more streets. He seemed fine when we arrived, no fear. “Good”, I thought. The doorbell was answered by three barking dogs and two surprised humans. “I brought your dog home, “ I said.
Time for another surprise. He wasn’t their dog. Nick had seen him early that morning in their yard, but when he opened the gate, the dog ran out. Either someone else put him there or he crawled in under an opening in the fence and could not get out. At least he had been safe for the night. And he would be safe that night. They took him in and would try to find out if he was lost or needed a new home.
Is Someone Missing You?
The next day, Janet took him to the vet. The scan revealed no microchip. The vet said his pads looked burned but were healing. That explained his slight limp. Poor boy. We surmised that he must have been a house dog. He had trouble walking on gravel, and we have a lot of that around here. Did he rub his pads raw from too much walking? Was the pavement too hot for him? More unanswered questions.
What was becoming obvious was that if his family looking for him, they didn’t live around here. They neither posted Lost Dog signs with his face on it in our area nor listed him on the town lost and found dogs page. There were no calls made to local shelters by his frantic guardians, no joyful responses to his “found” photo.
This scenario didn’t make sense. Here was a dog with clean, shiny fur, clipped nails, and clean teeth. He had been neutered. He walked well on a leash and even sat before getting in the car and when asking to go potty. Someone had obviously loved this dog and spent time with him. Where were they? If they dumped him, why and when? Could they not get him into a shelter because they were refusing dogs due to the coronavirus? We will never know.
Going Home
What we do know is that thanks to each person who lent him a helping hand, his rescue story has a happy ending. I didn’t get to see Baloo (so named by Nick after the Jungle Book bear) before he left for home with his new forever family, but I smile at the image in my mind of him snoozing on the couch with Janet and Nick. They gave him the best of care and found him a wonderful family to love. Renamed Duke, he now shares a home with a mom and a seven-year-old girl who adore him and shower him with toys and affection.
I will be forever grateful to my neighbors who are no longer strangers, those who stepped up to save Duke. And sadly, I will continue to pray for the many frightened lost and abandoned dogs roaming outdoors in the nights to come. May they also be given a helping hand by kind-hearted strangers who care enough to go the extra mile to keep them out of harm’s way. Bless you. May the day come when such prayers are only memories of a dismal past turned into a brighter future.
Some Final Thoughts on Duke’s Story
I’d feel remiss if the synchronicities that transpired throughout this story were left unwritten. It may not be unusual to have a stray dog show up on your front lawn or to see him dining at a home up the road.
What does strike me as unusual, as perhaps the workings of Someone or Something working a miracle on Duke’s behalf, is that of all the roads Ted and I could have walked at any time of day or night, we “chose” the precise times when we’d see him, the roads where we’d find him. Of all the yards he could have been locked in by a passerby or his own doing, he ended up at Nick and Janet’s house, the home he needed to return to in order to meet his forever family.
Maybe you don’t believe in miracles. Maybe you wonder why they are bestowed on some, but not all. For that question, I haven’t an answer. It’s a mystery as great as the universe itself. But I’ve been around long enough to know that miracles happen every day if you are open to seeing them, every time a should-have-been accident is avoided or someone reaches out with kindness to help a stranger in any form, whether human or dog or an earthworm washed onto the pavement during heavy rains. As for Duke and his miracle, I will be forever grateful to have witnessed it and to have played a part in its unfolding.
And do not forget kindness to strangers, for by this, some who, while they were unaware, were worthy to receive Angels. Hebrews 13:2 Aramaic Bible in Plain English