Tree saves dog

“We can’t move it. It’s just too big.” The birch had fallen across the road sometime since Sunday's brush fires threatened these sprawling woodland acres. We had driven through this place then, hoping – and really not hoping – to see flames. Instead, we passed under low strange smoke that dimmed the sun to a golden darkness – every shadow ill-cast and urging us away, to the other side of danger. But four days later the fires were long cold, the ground charred black, wet from ample rain, nestling white boulders bright under blue sky.

No, we couldn’t move the tree. We turned around and drove back the way we had come adding time on to our trip. Passing the burned zone again, in my peripheral vision, a beagle – certainly the lost one whose family had been looking for him since Monday. This was Thursday. He’d lasted three nights and four days alone in the woods. Jake spotted our car. Spooked by his recent days and nights and cautious by temperament, he bolted for the hills beyond the burn. Jen took after him on foot, unlikely to catch him, but eager to save a life. My beloved creature of hope. I followed her as I must.

Jake was gone.
When it was clear we couldn’t catch him, we got in the car and headed back the way we had come, realizing that we had to tell his owners the news. Though the woods and hills or coyotes could take him, or he might fall down an abandoned well, he was still alive. A curious, fragile speck roaming hundreds of acres, he was alive and we saw him.

We clocked the distance from where we spotted him to the first crossing, our road. Then we stopped at home to call his people with the mixed news. Grateful that Jake was alive, they pressed us for his exact location. We gave every detail, wished them luck and resumed our trip.

A few hours later when we returned home we saw that Jake’s people had called us and left messages of thanks. They found him. He was safe home resting with a full tummy.

If that birch had not blocked the road, our path would not have crossed Jake’s path. We would not have had good news for Jake’s family. The downed tree thwarted us, but made us available for another plan, which we could not have foreseen – a plan that saved a creature’s life. We thought we knew what was coming, but clearly didn’t. We did, however, make ourselves open to what was before us and responsive to something redemptive and far better than our plans.