February 2012: Wildwood, Missouri
My wife Annamarie and I had been called into action. Our Grandchildren Michael and Claire needed someone to watch over them while our son Bill and our daughter-in-law Paula went to Hawaii on a much-deserved vacation.
Watching two well-behaved young teens was a breeze; they were more than self-sufficient; a little breakfast in the morning, they were off to school, leaving us plenty of leisure time during the day. Lest I forget we also had to “care-take” two puppy dogs. One of them our little white Molly, the other their dog Jet, who true to his name, was black. Each of them weighed between 15-20 pounds, and they got along famously.
So on one amazingly warm and balmy day, while the kids were in school, we decided to take the dogs on a car ride to a park that our daughter-in-law had shown us. It was about a 15-minute drive or so from the house, and we were sure the dogs would appreciate the opportunity to get out and get some fresh air. We knew both dogs liked being driven around in the car, particularly with the windows down. The whole thing seemed like a “no brainer.”
On car rides with us, Molly usually rides in the front passenger seat, on my wife’s lap, her head out the window taking in every conceivable smell as well as the wind on her face. We were certain Jet would be fine in the back seat with the windows down. That of course was pure conjecture. We had heard that Jet might, at times, want to jump out of the car window moving or not, so we made sure his leash was on so we could control him if necessary.
That strategy worked for the first thirty seconds or so, and then Jet leaped into the front seat straight for Molly’s window, presumably to share the space with her. Despite the rather large passenger side window in our Ford Explorer, Molly was in no mood to “share” her treasured spot with the little black dog from Wildwood. She immediately bared her teeth and emitted her most viscous growl, letting Jet know to “vamoose.”
Jet got the message and immediately launched himself in my direction deciding the window on the driver’s side would do just fine. Suddenly, as we were wending our way up, over, and around a particularly “curvy” road, we passed a Great Dane and his master, sauntering along on, of course, the driver’s side. Any dog, especially a very large one, suddenly becomes an adversary, and Jet immediately launched a counter attack emitting noises that only an understanding person could comprehend or deal with.
At this point he endeavored to leap out the window and attack the Great Dane, but of course, with the leash restraining him he could not accomplish that. What I did not notice was that in all the frenzy of activity, Jet’s leash had wound itself around the gear shift handle, and as I pulled on the leash to restrain him, I plunged the gear shift into low, immediately slowing the car down and annoying the driver behind me, who then pulled out to pass. Believe it or not, there was a very attractive lady Poodle hanging out the passenger window of that car and Molly, watching all of this over her shoulder, suddenly launched herself onto my lap as well to give that Poodle a piece of her mind. Jet decided to “raise the bar” on the verbal assault on the Poodle, and leaped up onto the dashboard blocking my view out the window, and pulling the gear shift into neutral this time. I couldn’t at the time understand why the car wouldn’t move as I pressed on the gas pedal, on the other hand it didn’t really matter as I couldn’t see where I was going anyway.
Suddenly Annamarie assessed the situation and grabbed Jet’s leash to pull him off the dashboard, inadvertently shifting the car into drive. As I had been pushing down on the gas pedal while we were in neutral, the car leaped forward at a higher rate of speed than usual and suddenly we caught up with the Poodle again, further enraging both dogs.
By this time Jet had had enough of this whole situation and launched himself through the open window. Of course, he only got out by two or three feet, and found himself dangling out the window by his leash in danger of being “hung” and try as I might I could think of no excuse to tell his family how their precious little pup had met his fate.
I quickly formed a plan of action. I grabbed Molly with my right arm, and reached out with my left to scoop Jet back into the car. With one smooth motion I flipped Molly back onto Annamarie’s lap, reeled Jet in from outside the window and at the same time took control of the steering wheel with my knees. At this point we were on a two-lane road, with construction along our side so there was no place to pull over.
Well, as you might imagine with everything going on, I lost track, only for a moment mind you, of exactly where the leash and Jet were as I desperately tried to stay on track steering with my knees, and avoiding the construction workers along the side of the road. Imagine my amazement when I realized it was now around both my neck and the steering wheel, so every time I tried to steer one way or the other, I began choking myself with the leash. As we came around a particularly sharp curve to the left it was so tight I began gasping for air.
My best option was to pull over to the side of the road and re- group, possibly dumping the dogs alongside the road and heading home. Alas, that was not an option as the construction on the right side prevented that, and oncoming traffic on the left side wouldn’t allow me to pull over there. So all that was left to do was keep on “truckin” even though I could hardly breathe and I was now temporarily deaf from both dogs barking in my ears.
My only hope was to get Jet’s leash unwound from my neck, else I might pass out from asphyxiation. I reached up, grabbed Jets collar with my right hand, and swung him around over my head. He flew through the air with the greatest of ease, finally unwinding the leash from around my neck, but in the process I swung him into Molly knocking her into the back seat, and launching (potentially) one of the greatest dogfights in history. Fortunately, the blow knocked Molly unconscious and left Jet dazed. They now both lay listless in the back seat, side by side, which is what we had hoped for when we left the house.
Somehow all of these canine distractions had taken my mind off the road and I suddenly looked up and found ourselves careening off the road and down an embankment at the bottom of which was a stand of trees and a pile of rocks. Everything seemed like slow motion as we rolled down the side of the hill, the brakes not able to slow us down as we gained momentum.
The last thing I remembered before blacking out was the two dogs seemingly floating in air as we tumbled to our demise. I could barely hear Annamarie’s cries for help, as I was still partially deaf from the barking. I vaguely recall hearing a Geico commercial on the radio, the last memory I had.
After what must have been an eternity I slowly regained consciousness. I opened my eyes to see three sets of eyes staring at me. One set belonged to Annamarie, sitting there in her robe; you can guess who the other two sets belonged to! I realized I was in our bed in the guest room, and then I heard the sweetest words ever, “Tommy, that was some kind of dream you were having, you were thrashing around, holding your neck and moving your knees every which way. You made such a commotion both dogs came up to see what was going on.”
“But,” she went on, “Now that you are awake I have an idea, it’s such a nice day why don’t we take the dogs for a ride to that park that Paula showed us?”
