Dog

Yesterday, I went out for a bike ride like I do most Sundays. As I neared my house on the way home, my route crossed over CA 85, a four lane freeway with sound walls on one side and a steep bank on the other. I happened to glance over the side and noticed a dog walking in the middle of the southbound lane. She was crossing over the southbound lane, heading for the medial separator. She looked like a teenager out for a romp, walking across the highway, looking around, stopping occasionally to avoid a car, but intent on crossing the lane nonetheless. Not aware of the mortal danger she was in. By this time, I had stopped my bike and pulled off onto the sidewalk. I quickly glanced at another guy standing down the bridge from me, riveted to the fence by the drama playing out below us, as I was.

Traffic was light and the cars in the southbound lane managed to slow or stop, letting her pass over to the medial barrier. She jumped the medial barrier and started across the northbound lane, but there she wasn't so careful.  She darted out in front of a blue Prius. The driver braked but didn't manage to stop. The front bumper caught the dog and dragged her along for a couple feet before she was thrown  onto the medial shoulder. I cringed, grabbed my head and shouted "No!" but there was nothing I could do. Traffic was too loud, the dog was too far away, and all I could was turn away or stand there and watch her get hit. I chose to stand and watch.

The dog lay on the medial shoulder, its mouth open. A couple times, its jaw opened and closed. It wasn't bleeding nor were there any gashes or anything, though it did have a couple of abrasions on its side. A woman stopped on the southbound medial shoulder and walked down to the where the dog lay on the other side, a cell phone to her ear. I walked over to the other guy. He was my neighbor, and he, too, had a cell phone to his ear.

"Are you calling the police? " I asked.

"Yes, the dog has a tag, so it must belong to someone," he replied, turning away from the phone briefly to address me.

"I think she's paralyzed," I said, "I noticed she open and close her mouth a couple times but she hasn't moved. I think she might have to be put down."

He dutifully reported this to the police. After talking with the police some more, he turned off his cellphone and put it in his pocket.

"I have to get home, my wife is waiting for me," he said.

"OK," I replied and he ran off.

I watched the woman below talking on the phone, and stared at the dog for a few more minutes before remounting my bike and heading home.

I guess there's a lot more I could say about this on the metaphorical side. How sometimes I've been like that dog, blindly putting myself into circumstances that are dangerous and could lead to serious harm. How everyone does that at times. How, in a sense, the whole of the human species is in that position now with accelerating climate change and environmental destruction. But, in the end, the reality is this: a dog suffered and maybe died yesterday, took dangerous risks for reasons only the dog knew, and I got to witness it. That is one of the things practice is all about, witnessing suffering. Even when you can't do anything to help.