Dog Day Afternoon

Dog Day Afternoon*

A windy (yet true) tale about my early days as a parts clerk

It was during a postal strike many years ago, that I had to deliver invoices as well as my regular deliveries. This put me behind in my regular schedule and I sometimes tried rash short cuts in an effort to get caught up.

The rain had been coming down in sheets since early morning and judging from the slate gray sky it wasn't going to let up any. I had delivered all the orders for the town I was in and decided to take the back road in the ass end of the place to the highway. That is when disaster struck. The tiny dirt road had been sucking up rain since morning and even though it looked fine, I promptly got the delivery van stuck up to the axles. So much for getting caught up.

What had been a pretty little tree-lined road was now a quagmire of sucking black pudding and it was all I could do just to get out of the truck and over to the edge of the road where the earth was a bit firmer. The rain was still thundering down and I was immediately soaked to the skin as I slogged back towards the nearest house.

The town is a small vacation community, or at least it was; it's a lot bigger now, but at that time there was a fair hike between houses, especially on the outskirts where I was. The first house on the road was a beautiful little summer cottage complete with fancy lattice and a lovely wrap-around veranda. I was glad to be free of the muddy road as I walked up the cement sidewalk to the house, stepped onto the veranda and looked into an open door to my left. "Hello?" I called.

Then I heard it.

A low resonant sound that once you hear, you never forget. It was a very quiet growl. Slowly I turned and looked over my right shoulder to the open space of the veranda. There, curled up in a large wicker dog bed, was a beautiful example of Doberman Pinscher with a lovely white set of sharp looking teeth.

I'm sure that my eyes were huge as I whispered, "Nice doggie…"

I don't recall going back down the steps of the veranda, rather that I moved slowly as fast as I was able; (believe me, it is possible) backwards the way I came. I was so scared that I almost peed myself; kind of redundant now that I think about it, since at that point I was wet clean through anyway. Thank heavens that the dog had no desire to follow me into the pouring rain.

I had to trudge through another quarter mile to the next row of houses, which were part of the town proper. The road had evolved into a back lane in the rear of a strip of row housing with a high cinder block wall that I had to walk to the far end of, to get to the short alley that led to the front street. I could hear dog voices of all types as I trod along beside that wall, and every yip, bark and bow-wow sent my heart racing after my near brush with certain death.

…Now don't get me wrong, I like dogs. I have a dog. However, large strange dogs have a habit of biting delivery people. I was once bitten by an old St. Bernard cross, which could have easily been mistaken for a rug. Honestly, in all the times I had come and gone to that shop I had never seen that dog move. On the other hand, I had never seen an older woman vault over a large office desk like the dog's owner did, either. So you can see why I was paranoid. My rule was after that: If I saw a dog, I stayed in the truck until I saw someone that belonged to the dog.

Well, back to my story… There I was: wet, recovering from a heart attack and feeling naked without my truck. I turned into the alley and to my right was the wooden fenced back yard of the last unit. I decided I could save myself some time by ringing the back bell and opened the gate.

Straight into the barking, growling and snapping face of an angry, wet German shepherd on a very skinny looking tether. I jumped up and back into the far wall of the alley without even bending my knees. The gate slammed itself shut but I could still hear the ferocious barking coming from its other side. I felt like crying after being terrified twice in the last half hour but again it was redundant because any tears would have been lost in the rainwater running down my face.

Trudging out onto the street, I walked up to the first door I could see. I rang the bell. The look on the face of the boy who answered the door, told me what a sight I must have been, mud up to my knees, soaking wet and by that time shivering with the cold (as well as fright). I explained that I was stuck and asked to use the phone to call a wrecker. The young man was very kind. He laid a trail of newspaper into the kitchen, to a chair by the phone and even went and got me a towel. I had called for the tow and sat scrubbing my hair with the towel when flying out of nowhere came two miniature poodles. They bounded up into my lap, squirming, yipping and licking my face.

All the tension was gone. I laughed almost giddily with relief. I knew then that my day of doggy terror was over.

*(Previously posted at Beyond Uber - thanks to Celine & Raven for requesting "a ramble")

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