The Curious Incident of the Dogs in the Nighttime.
7 December 2008 @ 18:11
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A couple of Wednesdays ago a sad incident occurred. Ferris would not settle; he whined, he barked, he growled, he paced. Bedtime came, still he would not settle. We were up and down for the best part of an hour trying to quiet him and get him off to sleep. Finally a bang came on our front door at midnight. I feared neighbours who were enraged by the fearful puppy, but no, it was a neighbour, but one who was concerned. ‘There’s a dog out the back and my two dogs won’t settle’ she said, ‘I haven’t got a torch, so could you and your husband have a look?’ Once Chicken and I had got wrapped up we went behind the houses – all of which are nestled on the side of a very steep bank – and Mr C shined the torch up behind the house of some people who only use it occasionally as a second home. A pair of shining eyes with a barking mouth beneath them peered back in the beam of light. Chicken made his way along the roof of the middle house and then to the corner, he called back reporting that there were two very frightened Labradors behind the third house. I struggled along in the dark, whilst Chris calmed the first black labby; the second was a chocolate bitch who appeared to be hurt in some way. Once I made it along behind the weekend home we caught the black dog and got her on a lead, I lead her and Chicken carried the non-too-slim choccie one all the way back on slimy leafs and along the flat roof. At one point he tried to rest for a moment, laying the choc bitch down for a mere second and she bite him viciously – she was obviously in some pain… Eventually, he/we got the two to our neighbour’s house and left them with her. At 1:30am a vet collected the two lost dogs and Ferris and I finally got some fitful sleep thereafter. The next day we heard that the two had escaped when some children left the gate to their home open, the chocolate lab had broken her back and had to be put down. You spend some time thinking ‘if only’; if only I’d heard earlier and saved her from falling, if only the gate had been closed, if only we could have done something… But if you carry on in that vein you’ll drive yourself insane. If only I’d been able to predict this or that. You have to accept that we did what we could and it ended very sadly; but Ferris still got a few extra cuddles that night, all the same. |
You did all you could and that’s all you could do.