monday 12 sept 2005

I left my friend’s house late last night, around half past midnight, pretty sure that I had all of the street names down, and that I was heading in the direction where I thought I had parked my car. I parked quite a ways away because the parking in my friend’s neighborhood was tight, and so I ended up about six or seven blocks away from his house. I walked down his street, made a right and then made the left that I was supposed to make, and kept on walking. I know I was heading in the right direction up until I made the left, but about two blocks down that street, things started to look a little unfamiliar.

I made another right, thinking that maybe I was on the right track, but, really, I already knew that I wasn’t. All of the houses and apartment buildings on this street were new to me; hadn’t seen them before. I wasn’t all that upset that I couldn’t find the car, because I knew that it was in only a few blocks’ radius. I figured that I would just walk along all of them, systematically knocking them off as I passed, and hoping for some familiarity to come. I walked a few more blocks and saw a streetsign ahead that I at least recognized, and from there I would know where I was, but I still wouldn’t know where my car was.

I approached the intersection of the street that I was walking along and the street that I recognized and stopped. From the corner of my right eye I saw something across the street and looked over to see a small dog, about 35 pounds and 15 inches tall, standing on the corner across the street, looking over at me. This surprised me that he was just standing and looking at me, but because of this I knew right away that he wouldn’t run if I kept cool. I said ‘hi’ and waved, because, well, I always say ‘hi’ to dogs, and then called him over. The dog moved slowly across the street, but when I crouched down to his level he began to trot and then to run over to me. I started to pet him right away, and I think that he was grateful for the attention. He rolled over and asked for a belly rub.

He had on a collar, so that was a good sign, and while reading the red heart-shaped tag I quickly realized, oops, that he was in fact, a she. Nina was her name, she was out on her own past midnight, and I guessed not where she was supposed to be. There was a 510 area code phone number on the tag, so I pulled out the cell phone and dialed. It was already about 12:40 am, but if my dog were out on her own, I would damn well want to be woken up to come and get her. So I called, and after about three rings, a woman, clearly just waking up from the ringing phone, answered with a sleepy “Hello?”

“Hi, sorry for waking you up, but do you have a dog named Nina?”
“Um, Yeah.” she said, probably wondering what the hell I was talking about at that time of night, so I explained,
“Well, she’s out with me at the corner of Oakland and Moss, we’re out on the Northwest corner.”
“Okay, I’ll be right out.”
“Okay, we’ll wait here.”

Well, good, Nina was about to go home. I was going to bring her home with me if I had to, but since the phone number was good, she would get a nice reunion. I was tired and didn’t feel like standing, so I sat on the corner with her to wait and started to pet her. At that point I honestly didn’t know from where her owner was going to be coming. She could be coming from down the street, or it could be from blocks away. Nina was very cute, and rolled over for a belly rub again. Hmm, I was thinking maybe I shouldn’t have called in the first place. No, I wasn’t really thinking that, I would hate it if someone even thought of stealing my dog.

A very short while after I sat and started petting Nina she sat up, her ears perked, and she began staring across the street, seeing and hearing something that only dogs can. Her owner was coming, Nina could sense it, and I felt good.

The person to appear from the shadows wasn’t the woman who answered the phone, but instead a man. He was carrying a leash and as soon as Nina saw him come out from the shadows, she got excited and began to cross the street. I told her to wait, and the she did, before I looked both ways, and then told her it was alright to cross, after which she bolted right for the man. Good, I thought, she obviously knows and likes this man.

I said ‘hi’ to him as he leashed her up, he asking me where she was when I found her. I told him about seeing her across the street as I was walking and pointed to the corner where I had initially spotted her. I asked if she normally gets out, and he said no, and that he couldn’t figure out how she did it, because they had checked to make sure that everything that needed closing was closed before they went to bed. He thanked me, we shook hands and went our separate ways.

About three minutes later I found my car.

This was a reason that it took so long to find my car initially: I had a job to do.

I had to make sure that a dog named Nina made it home safely.

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