Monday, April 27, 2009

No Posters Needed

About a year before Katie was born, I lost my wedding ring. I was working at the little coffee shop in our cute downtown area and I just lost it. I had the worst fear that I'd dumped it in the garbage, along with a days worth of earthy spent espresso. Not the best place to dig in hopes of finding an heirloom platinum wedding ring, one who's setting was from my grandmother and who's diamonds were from my original engagement ring. Irreplaceable, in both body and spirit.

It was there one minute, and the next, I looked down and it was missing - a bare ridge on my ring finger the only evidence that it had ever even been there.

I felt sick.

I looked and looked and looked. Days went by, I was glum. I asked everyone I knew and searched everywhere I'd been for that ring. I had just about exhausted all of my resources, a "missing wedding ring" ad placed in the local paper being my one and only hope left. And miraculously, after the end of 2 very long weeks, I got a call from someone claiming to have found my ring. She described it perfectly and with a little back and forth, we determined that it was mine.

I could have died.

Yesterday morning, the boys let Roy out for his usual morning routine of marking the boxwood in the backyard. When he didn't come back to the door and whine like a newborn baby, I grew a little suspicious. I asked the boys to see if he was ready to come back in and their frenzied answers confirmed that yes, someone had left the gate open. Roy had indeed followed his nose towards greener pastures (aka: probably in search of a female or some wild, frisbee dog competition being held somewhere in the vicinity of our neighborhood). Roy, was gone.

I felt sick.

I stuck a baseball hat on my head, not wanting to disturb the lovely Sunday morning bedhead look I had going, grabbed the pyjama'ed (I love making up words) children and we hopped in the car to go look for our dog. We drove high. We drove low. We drove all parts in between. We stuck our heads out the window and whistled and called his name. We squinted and scanned each field, we searched each backyard and side street, we peered through each patch of trees and down each path. No Roy.

We were devastated.

Brett took the boys and decided to attack the situation via bicycle. They were gone a long time and I had hoped that looking this way would bring us that much closer to finding our dog. It didn't. After they returned home, heads hung low, I decided to go on another drive to try and find him. That didn't work either.

At this point, Roy had been gone nearly SEVEN hours. Much too long in our book. Fact is, he's only "escaped" a few times through a gate left ajar, and any amount of time away from us is too long...especially as far as the kids are concerned.

Now I know I complain about the dog hair, and about how weirded out he gets when he can't be with the kids, but he really is a great dog. Just the night before, I was watching as Katie drug him across the living room floor by his paws and placed his head on a pillow. He could care less, he was limp as a noodle and completely under her spell. I noted to myself, right then and there, that here we definitely had a dog who would let the kids do anything to him. If they had wanted to braid his hair and dress him up like Raggedy Ann, he would oblige.

Whatever they want, he would try and do and we were darn lucky to have a dog like him.

And now, he was gone. Gone for SEVEN hours.

I was getting ready to make "Lost Dog" posters when I went upstairs to Wyatt's room to close his window and I peeked through the pane...there he was! In the neighbor's yard, marking their rose bushes like he always does.

Where had he gone?

We all rushed to the front door and screamed for him. I'd say we called him calmly by name, but you know that was not the case. He came, predictably panting, bounding in the house and barking like crazy. I've never heard him bark so much in my life (which isn't really that long, given that he is only approaching his 2nd birthday this June). It was clear that he was happy to be home, hungry and thirsty. Surprisingly, he had not a speck of mud or trace of dirt on him, only a little green on his paws where he'd obviously come in contact with freshly cut grass.

But SEVEN hours?

I'm not going to worry about where he'd gone, I'm just glad he is back home where he belongs. And the next time I take him on a walk and he lifts his leg three hundred times to mark, I won't tell him not to do that, for that may have been how he found his way back to us.

Either that or someone on the next cul-de-sac is running an underground frisbee dog party and he finally got kicked out for showing off.


15 comments:

Carrie said...

I'm so glad he's okay!

Ashley said...

He's an Aussie! My favorite breed. We just got a new Aussie today to replace our one that died a year ago. She's a blue merle too.

I'm so glad he's home. Aussies are the best dogs you can have.

Shania said...

Oh, how scary! I'm glad he's home, safe and sound.

Kerrie said...

One of my worst fears! I'm glad he's OK!

Little Miss Sunshine State said...

Don't you wish he could tell you about his 7 hour adventure?

Jenn @ Juggling Life said...

I'm so glad he's home. Our dog was missing for several hours once (somehow he became trapped in a neighbor's yard and never once barked when we called him) and I was beside myself.

flutter said...

whew!

Unknown said...

7 hours is enough to make you crazy! The last time ours got out for that long he wound up at the pound. :( So glad Roy came home safe and sound.

Kyla said...

I think we have the only dog who WILL NOT run away. If the gate it open, she walks to the front door and whines to come back in.

Glad you found him!

wyliekat said...

Geez, he's gorgeous, too! What a sweet looking lad!

Only one of our cats obliges the girls with the mauling and hauling with nary a whimper, and that's our orange buddy, which lends credence to my theory that orange cats are the best natured of the bunch.

Ashley said...

I posted some pics of our new Aussie if you want to check them out.

Liz said...

SO glad to hear that you found him!!! Our precious dog passed away last week & it has been torture on the kids. I'm so glad that Roy is OK!!!

Jaye @ canadian-mom.ca said...

I'm happy that he made his way home. What an adventure for the whole family, though!

ella said...

So glad he came home!

He is so beautiful too. Really striking!

Becky at lifeoutoffocus said...

omg this happened to us once and i can relate to that sick feeling! i'm glad he came back home!