What Does It All Mean?

Ella and I went for a walk tonight. For the first time, I was able to really see what my neighborhood looks like. Daylight-Saving Time really didn't do me any favors, though. The most memorable sights were as follows (and in no particular order): a lot of soggy looking yards, a Christmas wreath on the door of one house, a pile of fluorescent leaf bags with jack-o-lantern faces piled high along the side of another, and dogs - everywhere - barking. Unleashed Dog even left his yard to keep Ella and I company on our walk; Ella did not appreciate the intrusion. She said as much in her nastiest, snarliest voice. Unleashed Dog then wandered into the road, lingering in the middle of a well-travelled intersection. An SUV approached slowly, and laid on the horn. Unleashed Dog was wide-eyed and apparently frozen, so I summoned him in my most welcoming doggy voice and posed myself in what is considered in the dog world to be a "friendly and playful" stance. Unleashed Dog then dashed across the street to join us, despite Ella's very inhospitable demeanor.

How does the story end? What happened next is too difficult, and not interesting enough, to explain. Suffice it to say that Unleashed Dog took his leave. He dashed safely across the street but not in the direction of home, which concerned me. Ella and I concluded our walk. Once she was fed and watered, I slipped out of the house to collect Unleashed Dog. Or at least look for him until I was convinced that he was safely home.

I didn't have to walk far to spot him. He was not alone. It was dark, so the person with the hand around his collar was hard to distinguish. "Is that your dog?" I asked. A very pre-pubescent male voice answered from the dark: "Yes." I asked him if he would like my leash, which I brought to collect his dog. He politely replied "No, thank you." The tone in his young voice said clearly that this was the end of our social encounter.

On the short walk home, I had a chance to inspect an object on the ground that had been of great interest to Ella on our walk. I hurried her away from it because it looked like either a dead animal, or a chocolate covered rabbit. I was half right. It was a small, stuffed rabbit that looked as if it had been dipped into a mud fondue fountain. I picked it up by the ear, which was the only clean area on its little body, and carried it home.

Why? I don't know. I can't tell you. Maybe its the same reason why I rescued a boxelder bug from the sink as I prepared a dish-soap bath for the tar baby rabbit I pulled off the road; or put a yellow-rose corsage into a water-filled vase. Maybe its the same reason I talk to my mail when I take it out of the box...could there actually be a good reason for that?

In many ways, the world just seems to me to be a very fragile place. But now, perhaps, I am just projecting...