We came home last night to find one dog, instead of two and a piece of our heart missing.
The pain is intense and my heart is breaking in a gazillion pieces right now... yes, while I never had birthday parties or made my dogs wear little sweaters I feel as though I need to confess that I am "a crazy dog lady" similar and some might say a sister of "the crazy cat lady". You know the kind, carries an extra dog leash around in case I come into contact with a stray wearing a collar, gives away dog food to homeless people with pets.
The community we live in has two security people constantly patrolling and handsome was quick to give them a picture of Miss Sydney and her stats. We have a large community that is gated but a neighbor decided to tell handsome she is pretty sure that she saw Sydney running with another dog towards the main gate... I guess there is no great way to say something like this but it felt like a million tiny daggers invading my heart and soul to hear this.
Regarding neighbors, this has been the biggest transition. I am used to having some kind of small neighborly relationship with people and the city I am currently living in houses many commuters- myself included. I haven't connected with any other neighbors as they are not real neighborly. Handsome and I have nicknames for a few - for instance, our favorite neighbors (can you pick up on the sarcasm?) whom we lovingly call the Jesus freaks. They earned their title by placing an empty *manger* on their front lawn bestowed with a red light. The big problem was that the manger was the size of a casket and looked more like a Halloween decoration with the red light on it than an homage to Jesus. Did I mention they live directly across from our home? Religious freedom and the expression of, aside, these very Christian people will barely make eye contact and no longer speak to handsome after he declined an invitation to their weekly Monday night bible study that takes place in their home. I wasn't ready to run over and knock on their door to ask if they had seen Sydney.
Then there are the neighbors on one side of us who are different and I don't know how to explain it other than the husband has a bit of the crazy eyes and the wife is a mail order bride from Russia, who I thought was his daughter. We call them "From Russia, with love" or Boris and Natasha, depending on our mood. Natasha was the one who mentioned the whole dog running toward the gate statement. They have a brand new boxer puppy and so I would hope to think they have a bit of sympathy toward the situation.
****
I got in the car and drove around, screaming her name, holding a flashlight, sobbing and waiting for her to walk out of some random area and come prancing toward me... it never happened.
I am a firm believer that people come in and out of our lives, at different times and for different reasons - I wasn't ready to apply nor accept this theory towards my puppy. Handsome asked me this morning if we thought of everything - Call the humane society - check (had to leave a message), let the entire world know our dog was missing- check, scour the neighborhood- check. She has a chip so I am holding out hope that this will be the saving grace. I never, NEVER see dogs running loose in this city so perhaps their animal services department is really on their game, we'll see.
Did I miss anything?
