HOW MUCH IS THAT DOGGIE BY THE WAYSIDE?

November 1st, 2007 |

Author: Family Friendly Pets // Pets, Livestock, and Wildlife // ArticlePros.com

There was a terrible storm raging that afternoon as we drove home from seeing my parents. Suddenly, we saw a little brown dog in the road. My husband said he thought the pickup truck in front of us had dropped the dog.

“Oh, Tim,” I wailed, “let’s stop and get it! It’ll get killed on this road. We can take it to a pet shop later and have it put up for adoption. Pleeeeaaaassseeee!”

We stopped.

“It won’t come to you,” Tim warned as I got out of the car.

Naturally, it did. I got back in the car and told Tim, “Never underestimate the power of Ellie Mae.” (Clampett, that is, critter lover extraordinaire.)

I rode the rest of the way home with a sopping wet dog on my lap. He was, however, a clean dog. For some reason, I began calling him Fred, and he responded to it. We took Fred inside to towel him off so I could take a photo of him with the digital camera.

By this time, I was convinced that someone somewhere was looking for Fred; and I planned to use the photo to make a flyer. Fred was not only well-mannered, clean, and affectionate; he was also housebroken. My son loved Fred. I loved Fred. Fred was beginning to grow on my daughter. My husband was not enamored of Fred at all. He said Fred had to go. I could see Tim’s point. We have a virtual petting zoo: kitten, dog, rabbit, fish. But then, I looked at Fred’s happy little face and my son’s happy little face, and I wondered, “how much could one more dog cost?”

And then I found out.

Deciding that Fred is such a sweetheart that he HAD to belong to someone, we took the flyer and returned “to the scene of the crime.” Our plan was to go door to door asking people in that neighborhood if they’d lost this precious dog.

As we were about to turn into the driveway of House Number One, we felt a shuddering jolt and heard a horrendous crash. Thank God no one was hurt. No one, that is, except poor “Allie” our Oldsmobile Alero that we had had for less than two months.

The four boys who hit us were going so fast that even after hitting us, they couldn’t get stopped until after they’d plowed through a fence, hit a telephone pole, and then smashed through a boulder in a field. I have to hand it to the kids–they were honest. The driver confessed to the State Trooper that he was going about 80 miles per hour (on a rural, 55 mph. road).

So, how much WAS that doggie by the wayside? I guess we’ll find out when we get the fair market value report on our car.

Not to be outdone, we people gathered to look at the wreckage and to tell us they’d called 9-1-1, I pulled out Fred’s flyer. Unfortunately, no one at the accident scene recognized him, and no one claimed him.

I could say it was a bad day, but no one involved in the crash was hurt. That was certainly a blessing. Poor “Allie” sacrificed herself for her family; and like the Bionic Woman, they “have the technology. [They] can rebuild her.” Fred was adopted by a man whose mother lives in our neighborhood. The man has a little girl, and as you know by now, Fred loves children.

So the moral of this story is: when you don’t know whether to laugh or cry, go ahead and laugh. It’ll all work out.

Gayle Trent is a full-time freelance writer, editor and author. Visit her at http://www.gayletrent.com. If you're interested in becoming a writer, please visit Gayle's site http://gayle24202.tripod.com/teleseminarsandclasses.