Yesterday morning I received a whatsapp text from one of my neighbors who had spotted a small, terrified dog on the other side of the tiny river at the bottom of our hill. She took a photo of it and asked if it belonged to anyone we knew. Wait, before going on, I should note that, years ago, my neighbors and I created a whatsapp group that enables us to get in touch quickly should anything happen or if anyone needs anything or whatnot. This group is super useful at times, as it was yesterday, as it turns out…

Some of my neighbors immediately mobilized to help this little dog. They didn’t wait for the municipal police to arrive but got a ladder, lowered it down into the tiny river, really no more than a stream, and carried the dog over to the other side, to safety.

I was still at home when all this happened. But as soon as I got my neighbor’s message and photo, I remembered something I’d seen earlier that morning on Facebook, a desperate appeal posted by a woman whose dog had run off the day before, with her leash on. I took another look at the photo on Facebook and, yes, I was sure it was the same dog.

So I texted my neighbor to tell the policewomen, who had just arrived, to call the FB woman’s cellphone. I then went down the hill to see if I could help. The poor little dog was still terrified, so terrified that she had refused to eat anything, even though she must have been starving. So we (a bunch of concerned neighbors and two lovely municipal policewomen) just stood around, keeping our social distance and wearing our surgical masks, of course, until the dog’s happy owner arrived. All of a sudden, the terrified, motionless little dog became the happiest dog in the world…dancing around and licking her owner, as you can see in this happy photo I took (cutting off the woman’s head, sorry!, for privacy reasons)…

And to think that if I hadn’t seen and remembered the appeal on Facebook, the policewomen would have had no choice but to take that scared little dog over to the municipal kennel, and it might have taken days for them to track down her owner…

I’m soooo glad that didn’t happen.

Anyway, all’s well that ends well. I helped save a dog yesterday, and it made me feel like a goddess for the rest of the day. 😉