My Adventure with Daisy

Admittedly, this is not actually Daisy; but a dog that looks a lot like her

I have always been an animal lover, pretty much my whole life.  As a small child I was afraid of dogs, even tiny fluffy ones, but I got over it one day when my mom and I played with a labrador puppy at the beach, and I was immediately smitten.  I have wanted a dog pretty much since that day, only never could get one thanks to siblings with allergies.  Eventually I got a cat, and the rest was history.  While I have been labeled a Cat Person since then, I definitely still love dogs, and pretty much every animal, come to think of it.

Yesterday I had an adventure that is the kind of thing I would have *loved* when I was a kid.  It was still pretty fantastic as an adult.  My husband and I came home from the farmers market and saw a familiar elderly beagle wandering around the parking lot.  I had seen her before, only this time she was clearly by herself and without her owner.  I hopped out of the car and went to check to see if anyone was around – it is not unusual for people in our complex to walk their dogs off-leash.  When I approached, there was an adorable little cat that had also come to check out the situation, and she and the dog were sniffing each other and interacting somewhat cautiously.

When I got closer, the dog went trotting off into the bushes.  The cat went after her.  So did I.  I found the dog sniffing everything, as beagles are wont to do, and managed to catch up to her and check out her tag.  It said her name was Daisy.  There were two phone numbers, but no address.  She didn’t have a leash, so I tried to get her to follow me back to our place, which was only a few doors away.  She kept her nose to the ground, but seemed perfectly content to follow me for a bit.  Only then she suddenly veered off toward a front door a few doors down from our place.  The cat was still following us, by the way, and also came up to the front door.  Thinking this might be Daisy’s home, I rang the doorbell.

An elderly lady came to the door, and seemed very happy to see me, Daisy, and the cat.  She quickly assured me when I asked that Daisy was not her dog, and she wasn’t sure who she belonged to, but the cat belonged to her next door neighbor.   I thanked her and started off on my way, with both Daisy and the cat following me, only the cat saw her home next door, which happened to have the front door wide open, and she went into her house.  Daisy, unfortunately, followed at a full trot.  Not wanting to wander into a stranger’s house, I hesitated at the doorway.  The elderly lady thankfully had come with me, and she called out for Susan, the woman who lived there.

Susan appeared and saw the dog running full speed into her house, and wasn’t sure what to do.  There was yet another cat inside the house who looked none to happy to have an aged beagle running in her territory.  Daisy disappeared into a back bedroom.  Susan found some cat treats and managed to lure Daisy back out with them.  So picture this if you will – three women of various ages, two cats, and a senior citizen beagle, on a mission to get the beagle home.

This time the cats stayed behind, as did the other two women, and I led Daisy with my hand firmly on her collar (and therefore I had to walk in a very uncomfortable, hunched way, because she was a short dog *and* she kept her nose to the ground at all times).  We finally got to my place and I shut us both in on our deck so she wouldn’t run off.  I rang the doorbell so my husband could bring me the phone, and I kept a firm hold on Daisy’s collar so she wouldn’t run into our house and freak our cats out too.

John brought me the phone and I called the first number on the tag, only got a voice mail.  I left a message explaining that I had found Daisy and had her at our place.  Then I called the second number, and got a person.  His name was Noah.  He wasn’t home; the number was his cell phone.  But he was grateful that I had corralled Daisy and said he was on his way home.  He was flustered and actually couldn’t remember his address off-hand, so I couldn’t drop off the dog for him, even though he said his wife was home.

While Noah and I were talking, I heard a deep meow and looked up to see yet another cat, not one of the previously encountered ones, sitting at our gate, looking in at Daisy and me, and meowing incessantly.  I wasn’t sure what was up with Daisy that made her such a cat-magnet.  I hung up with Noah and saw that his wife had tried to call while I was on the phone with him, so I called her back.  I told her where we lived and she said she’d be over right away to pick up Daisy.  She seemed relieved, so I assume she must have noticed that Daisy had gotten out.

Meanwhile, the cat continued to meow at us, and Daisy became determined to get into our house.  She started whining and scratching at our front door.  John hadn’t closed it all the way after giving me the phone, so Daisy succeeded in getting the door open, and ran into our house.  Our cats were both terrified by her presence.  I chased after her and John managed to catch her, and we led her back outside again.  The cat was still there, meowing.

Finally Noah appeared at our gate to retrieve Daisy.  He thanked me profusely and when I pointed out the cat that was still sitting there watching us, he said that was their cat, Kit-Kat.  I can only assume Kit-Kat had come to try to get Daisy and bring her home.  At least that’s what I like to think.

So that was my adventure with Daisy.  I got to feel like a good Samaritan and a kid again, all at once.  Not a bad way to spend a half hour or so on a Saturday afternoon.

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