Schommer.Life

What the Hell Was That? 5/28/25                                          

It’s a random Tuesday and my husband was outside with the dogs before he headed to work for his evening shift. I happened to pick up overtime and was already at work.  We have two dogs, a mini Aussie (an overweight mini Aussie), Jasper, and a Papillon (aka she looks like a long hair chihuahua), Kayla. Jasper needs a leash, but Kayla can go on walks without a leash and stays with you.  

It’s spring in the city and everyone’s under the cabin fever spell. Living in the Midwest you never know what the weather will bring tomorrow, when it’s nice weather, everyone takes advantage. New drivers cruise with windows down and music blaring, couples walk their dogs, and the neighborhood kids ride their bikes causing chaos. Everything’s sunshine and rainbows. We should have known better. We know this. If you’ve never had a moment of poor judgement, you’re not human and can scroll to the next blog. 

Here’s how I gathered this went. 

Miguel’s outside with the dogs when the neighbor boy, who has been taunting the dogs, dashed around the corner on his bike, head on for my husband and fur babies. Kayla’s eyes widen and she sprinted for the door. There’s no time, the boy is on her tail, and she missed her turn for the driveway. Making a split decision, she kept running, and running, and running. Miguel tried to run after her with an overweight mini Aussie who had no idea what had happened. Despite Miguel yelling for the kid to stop, he chased Kayla all the way down the street and when she headed north, he stopped, looked at Miguel and the panting Aussie, pointed and said, “She went that way”. Kids are assholes. I know, we wanted the kid to stop, and he finally did, but by this time, Kayla was long gone. We had no idea she was that fast. Fight or flight, right. 

Miguel called me at work, “Babe, we have a problem.” 

“Problem? What problem?”

“Kayla took off, I can’t find her anywhere.”

“What?”

“Babe, the little boy down the road spooked her, she took off, he chased her, and she’s gone.” 

My heart sank. Our fur babies, they’re our babies. I mean, sometimes I love them more than our human babies. You know… Stop gasping… I know you know what I mean. 

And to my children, who I doubt are reading this, what can I say, they don’t talk back, and never move away. 

Miguel said, “I didn’t know he couldn’t run.” 

“Really? You didn’t know our 25 pound overweight Mini Aussie couldn’t run? Jokes on you.”

Miguel drove all over a 10 block radius offering the neighborhood kids money if they found our dog. I sped the hour drive home and call my sister.

“Dude, we lost Kayla. The dog, not the human.” 

I called the nonemergency police department. Maybe someone called to report her running like a mad papillon on anis. Sure enough, a wonderful woman named Kaitlyn was our hero. She called and left her name and number with the police and kept our girl safe and sound while they waited for us. She truly is a hero. She ran like the roadrunner, stopped traffic on Main Street and no doubt saved Kayla’s life. Beep, beep!

Kaitlyn, if you’re reading this, I can’t thank you enough. Thank you for being a wonderful human and Kayla’s hero!