The day Alvin ran away was a miserable one. I can’t adequately describe how horrible I felt. I had just ruined the lives of a family I cared for. They would never see their beloved pet again. I wasn’t sure they’d ever forgive me! Not long after my sister-in-law called her sister I got a phone call from Alvin’s mom. Despite the tragedy of losing her dog, she was so unbelievably calm and understanding about the whole thing. I explained what steps had been taken and that I was praying someone would find him and call.
We re-washed our clothes and took them to dry at the laundromat. We went grocery shopping. We continued with our day as any other. We never stopped thinking about Alvin. I went to bed praying for this little dog.
I woke up early Monday morning to make sure the twins were up for school and got out the door on time. I noticed it had rained during the night and my heart sank. While they were preparing for their day they talked about how bad they felt about the day before. So bad in fact that they thought they heard Alvin barking around midnight. I got hopeful that he was still in the neighborhood somewhere. Maybe someone would call today.
I opened the door for them as I was saying goodbye and waiting for us on the other side was this black curly wet ball of DOG! He had found us! I don’t know how, but Alvin had returned on his own! The boys HAD heard him the night before. I was so overjoyed I woke B and E up to witness this miracle. I think B just growled at me, but E was as happy as I was. I dried Alvin off and gave him food and water. I took a picture to send to his mom and realized it was 4 am where she was. Oh well. I sent it anyway. The relief was evident in her response back. The prodigal dog had returned!
Alvin stayed with us another week and a half. I can confidently say he never ran away again. Well…there was one this one time he started to one day and no one chased him. I guess without the challenge he wasn’t interested. My niece came to visit me the following weekend and Alvin was super excited to see a person he knew. See how happy he is?
By the time his family returned to pick him up we’d all fallen into a comfortable routine. He and B even mended their relationship and I caught them playing together several times. In fact Alvin started following B around the house.
Lest you think this is the end, there is another part to this tale.
As I mentioned last week, B and I got in our cars to search for the Alvin. My son J went with him and G and E came with me. We stopped and asked everyone we saw if they’d seen a little black poodle. Even our neighbor drove around a while looking for Alvin before he took his kids to the park. It wasn’t until a few days later our neighbor told us something very interesting.
Apparently, while he was at the park, a cop drove in and asked the parents there (including our neighbor) to be careful because they had received a call from concerned parents that a man with glasses in a black car had tried to abduct their child by asking about a lost dog (which is the oldest trick in the book). And he already had one kid with him! After the cop left, another woman commented that she had seen a crazy blonde man running down the street barefoot yelling at the top of his lungs. Our neighbor later discovered a community watch email about the possible pedophile incident.
B and our neighbor couldn’t stop laughing about the situation, while I couldn’t stop fuming! I couldn’t believe the stupidity and judgemental-ness of people and their jump-to-conclusions small-minded thinking! (I’m starting to get mad all over). BUT now in extreme hind-sight I can see the humor. Really, I can. To prove it I’ll share another cute photo of Alvin, this time with B. Pictures really do say 1000 words!
Tagged: Family, Lost dog, story, This and that
