Search and Rescue

“How could you have lost a plunger?” the clerk at the hardware store said on the phone. “What did you do with it?”

Clearly this was a repeat customer. Her tone of voice gave her away.

Was he asking for a replacement or help in finding it? I didn’t stick around to find out, but it did make me curious.

How could you lose a plunger? How could you lose any plumbing tool for that matter? They’re large enough to trip over.

I’ve lost rings down bathroom drains, wallets at check-out stands in supermarkets. I even lost Calvin once on a walk. He gave me signs that he was sufficiently trained to obey me, so I let him off leash. I blinked and he was gone. The next thing I heard him baying like a coyote in heat. He found a hole in the fence and wiggled through to dash after a hare. I called him, but he was deaf. Unlike sheep who obey the shepherd’s voice, Calvin ignored me as if he didn’t belong to anybody. He was his own master, and that scared me to death.

So much for the love and care I had given him over the years. So much for the training that didn’t stick. So much for the intense distress this was putting me through. He plainly didn’t care.

And then there was my son. This was his dog. He left him in my care while he went to college. “Son, I lost your dog. He’s probably dead. I’m sorry.”

Calvin was camouflaged in a thicket of bushes. I called louder. Nothing. I couldn’t climb the fence without tearing my body in pieces. I kept calling louder until I was hoarse. A park ranger heard me and opened a gate in the fence and let me in. I walked for miles calling Calvin’s name. Birds flew overhead. Squirrels rushed by me. Calvin was nowhere to be seen.

I never thought I’d do it, but after an hour I gave up. I turned back and walked to the car weeping.

As I got closer, I saw a silhouette of an animal by the driver’s side of the car.

It was Calvin, sitting there, waiting for me, with a smirk on his face.

Two emotions came flooding in. The first was relief that I wouldn’t have to tell my son his dog was dead. The second, I wanted to kill his dog.

Calvin says, “My body may have escaped, but my heart was always yours.”

Crossing the Border

A colleague of mine was recently on a road trip in Alabama. He was headed to a town north of Atlanta GA and stopped halfway for gas.

“Hey, you got a cat in there?” the guy next to him at the pump asked.

“Huh?” my colleague said.

“There’s definitely a cat…open your hood,” the guy said.

Sure enough there was a kitten lying on top of the battery. It got up and scrambled into the engine somewhere. That’s when eight people tried for 45 minutes to rescue it, but it eluded them.

My colleague had a meeting he had to get to on time, so he closed the hood and kept driving.

Another 100 miles at 75-miles an hour he got to his hotel, and turned off the engine. He could hear the kitten crying. He drove to the local tire store where the guys spent a half hour taking the car apart, and after chasing a frantic kitten around the engine, they finally captured it.

That kitten deserves a medal for its bravery, tenacity and powerful will to live. One of the guys felt the same way. He took it home to his wife.

Calvin says, “Stupid cats. No dog in his right mind would travel like that.”

A Serious Madness

The plan was to leave early for our drive to Oregon. Alf wanted to avoid the rush hour. I wanted to get there quickly to see the autumn leaves. Every hour that went by meant another leaf was falling to the ground and I was missing the spectacle.

We were on time with our plans until I couldn’t find my wedding ring. I looked in all the usual places. Nothing.

Time was ticking. The cars were backing up on the freeway. I could feel them.

“Do you think it went out in the clothes we donated to the Cancer Society last week?” Alf said.

I stopped breathing.

“I usually check all pockets,” I mumbled.

I doubled my search efforts. Every closet. The seats of furniture. Under towels in the linen closet. In shoes. Under the bed. I discovered a pair of boots there, but no ring.

Maybe I did donate it to charity.

If I did, I was going to be mature about it.

I was going to Oregon.

I would call the Cancer Society to see if they found a ring. Maybe they were holding it. People can be nice that way. Sometimes.

I wasn’t going to worry about it.

If worse came to worse, surely our homeowner’s insurance would cover it.

So we got in the car and were almost out of the city when I said, “Stop! I can’t go. This is going to ruin my vacation.”

“Mine too,” Alf said.

We turned back home.

It was now 9 a.m. Smack in the middle of rush hour.

I re-doubled my search efforts. The more I looked in all the same places the more insane I felt.

“Have you checked the clothes you packed?’ Alf said suddenly.

No, I hadn’t.

I unzipped the suitcase, pulled out two jackets – checked the pockets – nothing.

I pulled out a third jacket. There was my ring snuggled in the pocket.

Alf and I were so relieved we felt like dancing the tango in the driveway.

Calvin says, “That’s what you get when you send me off to the doggie hotel and I’m not around to sniff things out.”