Introducing Daisy, the namesake of the first part of our blog name and our nervous traveling partner. Daisy is a "rescue dog" supposedly brought north from a "kill shelter" in North Carolina via the modern equivalent of the Underground Railroad. That enterprise is composed of volunteers who collect the condemned dogs from these shelters, then relay them north until they reach safe foster homes where they are held until they can be adopted by suckers like us.
Our last four legged friend was also a "rescue dog" but I think that title indicated strangers would have to be rescued by him. Odie was so big that when he trotted around our house the floor would shake. He could stand straight up with his paws on Mary Ellen's shoulders, when sitting he could easily rest his head on our dining room table and was the terror of our staid neighborhood (at least the few times he got out.) We were on the "do not deliver" list for every pizzeria and Chinese restaurant in our area and we shamelessly began leaving our kids without a babysitter before we really should have since we knew that even the sound of his "I'm-going-to-rip-your-throat-out" snarling and barking would have kept even the most determined burglar or serial killer away. But like most Great Danes ( he had been advertised as a Great Dane Labrador mix perhaps because one of his parents was fantasizing about a Lab when he was conceived) Odie, although living beyond what most Great Danes do, had a shorter life-span than we had hoped for.
The one thing dog lovers are cautioned about is not immediately running out and getting another dog after the one you have goes to the Rainbow Bridge. I waited what I thought decency demanded (approximately forty-eight hours) before logging on to Petfinder.com to find, as Rudyard Kipling lamented, another dog to give our hearts to tear. And there was the cutest , sweetest little brown puppy with big brown eyes and that was that. We made contact with her foster care provider and drove down to southern New Jersey to meet her, Mary Ellen thinking "OK, I'll at least
look at her" and me determined to bring her home ASAP. I thought I was being pretty cool about it but it was love at first sight and Mary Ellen knew it was hopeless to argue.
We were really thrilled to see that Daisy was great in a car since Odie had a limit of about two minutes in a moving vehicle before he would begin projectile vomiting - or worse. So when we decided to start our RV wanderings we knew she might be nervous at first but with our luck we should have realized how she would react. "Terrorized" would be a mild word; traumatized approaches the reality but still doesn't do it justice.
She is particularly afraid of the wind and last Saturday evening it was blowing particularly hard when we made the mistake of leaving her (what we thought was) safely tethered outside. But a particularly strong gust sent her scurrying, knocking over the chair she was attached to. A neighbor tried to grab her lead but in doing so provided the tension she needed to slip out of her collar and then out of sight. Now, Orangeland is surrounded by a wall with about a twenty foot opening in the front so I posted myself at the gate and Mary Ellen charged around calling her name. Finally I saw her approaching and bent down to tell her what a good dog she was and get the collar back on her. But I didn't notice the terror still in her eyes and in an instant she gives me her best Barry Sanders move and is past me, out the gate and down the street the park is located on and out to a ten lane road near Angel's Stadium. I got out of the gate just in time to see her running past the cars waiting for the red light and out into the oncoming traffic.
It's a rare terror you feel when you realize you are about to watch someone (sic) you love die a violent death right in front of you; I knew that as she went out of sight I'd hear the screech of brakes signaling that she was gone. As I'm trying to run up to the intersection a shiny black convertible slams to a halt and this distinguished silver haired gentleman shouts "Get in!" He'd seen Daisy, saw me galumphing after her with the collar and leash in my hand and quickly realizing that I'd never catch her, decided to help. He hangs a huey at about thirty miles an hour, tears up the street right through the red light all the while yelling "Can you see her? Can you see her?" I can't and I'm mentally composing how I'm going to tell Mary Ellen about her death when he pulls into the Honda Center parking lot. "You get out and look over there and I'll keep cruising this side of the street." I'm in a state of controlled hysteria thinking that I'm never going to see her again when suddenly she is hurtling towards me from the huge culvert that cuts through this area. I cross onto an island in the middle of the street and somehow coax her over to me while the relief, adrenaline like, surges through me. How could I have been so lucky as to have a happy ending to this disaster? Mary Ellen comes up the street and takes Daisy while I trot over to our now smiling rescuer. "What's your name?" I ask. "Raoul" he replies shaking hands with me and I suddenly realize he looks and sounds exactly like The Most Interesting Man In The World from the Dos Equis commercials. Ironically he pulls into Orangeland in front of us and we follow him to his trailer to further gush our gratitude. He has a classy sounding Spanish accent and instantly I become a disgrace to the Tea Party by embracing full amnesty.
The next day we are at Petsmart early for a red harness that she cannot back out of, and updated name tag with our cell phone numbers and then home to the Internet to contact the chip service (she was chipped when she was under anesthetic to be spayed) with our latest info. How lucky can we get?
