Seeking Shadow

Yes, I'm writing about the dog again.

Shadow seems to really love our home. Nevertheless, he has run away approximately six times now.

Last week was one of those occasions. I was in the backyard (cleaning up dog poop, what else?) when one of the kids opened the back door, and Shadow bolted out like greased lightning.

Knowing I had no chance of simply catching him, I went in the house and gathered my supplies: a leash to lead him home, a hot dog to lure him, and a knife to cut the hot dog into toss-able pieces. I grabbed the first sharp knife I saw, which was a Cutco steak knife.

So, there I was walking around the neighborhood with a leash, a hot dog, and a steak knife . . . but no dog. After ten minutes without a sign of him, I loaded the kids and the supplies into the van so we could drive around and look for him. Half an hour later, we sadly returned home having seen neither hide nor hair of Shadow.

Naturally, as we pulled up to the house, Shadow came bounding around the corner onto our street and happily returned inside the house. The kids were ecstatic.

Later that afternoon, Josh was trying to find the leash to take the dog back out. I told him I had probably left it in the van.

He came in with the leash and a very concerned look on his face and asked, "Mom, why do you have a steak knife in the van?"

"Oh, I forgot about it. I took it in case I needed to cut up hot dog pieces to lure Shadow to me."

Relief literally washed over the face of my son, who like Eeyore, who has the ability to anticipate the worst-possible outcome to every scenario.

"Whew! I thought it was because if you found Shadow hurt, you might have to kill him."

Yes, son, I was going to put the dog out of his misery . . . with a six-inch steak knife.