The good news is, I can still sprint a mile, uphill all the way. The bad news is I found out on a rescue mission for Jake, who ran away again, walking within inches of horses, passing a cafe the police have nicknamed ‘the criminal cafe’, crossing busy roads and ending up in a supermarket parking lot next to a major highway.
This morning I woke and as usual fed Jake first thing – his needs always come first. Then, I collected up and plugged in the twenty one rechargeable lights we use to light the house at night. I gave Jake his Dental Stick, and went out to the carport to fill two buckets – our toilet flusher.
I’m going to feed the chickens, I announced to the h, who was deep into an email. I closed the door behind me, or thought I did, mindful of Jake’s tendency to take himself for a walk. The chicken feeding took awhile – we’re still in the midst of Operation Chicken Relocation, and the flock is confused, some feedings they follow me up to the coop crowding my feet and racing ahead, other feedings they mill around in the kitchen courtyard, uncertain and reluctant to follow me and necessitating I circle back, banging the scoop on the bucket and yelling Chickens! Follow me! Chickeeeeeeeens!
This morning it took especially long - half the flock followed me up to the coop courtyard, the other half waited for me poolside, milling around. I can’t blame them – the path from the pool to the chicken coop winds around, the walls obscuring their sight of me. I pop my head back around the corner to find a dozen roosters and hens standing still as if in superstitious surprise at the lady who keeps poofing into and out of existence. I have to drop a little trail of food to tempt them to round the corner; then there is yet another corner to round, and up three short flights of steps. It’s not simple, even for non-chickens.
I came back to the house. Chickens fed, I announced. I found my coffee made by the h and thoughtfully poured into a thermal mug to keep it warm. The h was still buried in his email in the living room, but Jake was not on his dog bed.
I smiled, knowing he was lying in the kitchen next to the treat bin. But he was not. I checked the guest room where he likes to nap – no Jake.
Where’s Jake? I asked the h. I dunno, he said. I thought he was with you.
I went back outside, coffee in hand, retracing my path to the chicken coop. No Jake. Then to the quinta, where our workers Tiago and Paulo had started their day, gutting the top floor. The h checked the lower unit where the electric company is scheduled to come out this morning and install our mono split, a heating/AC unit that attaches to the wall. The last time we thought Jake went missing, he was actually sitting on his dog bed in the lower level of the quinta, having followed the h into the unit and accidentally getting closed in.
But Jake was not there. We searched the property, calling. No Jake appearing sheepishly from the depths of the backyard, no Jake materializing at the foot of the cottage staircase. No Jake shuffling out of the east campo where he does his morning business.
I take care of all of his needs before mine, I said – yelled, really. I make sure he’s fed and watered and gets his treats before I even go to the bathroom…and this is how he acts, like he’s a prisoner that can’t wait to get away!
He always comes back, the h reassured me. But I would not be reassured.
He’s not smart, I yelled. He’s gonna get stolen by Gypsies or hit by a car! He d-d-doesn’t love us! I was cry-yelling by now.
I can’t listen to this, the he said. He left to do more searching.
Everytime he does this it’s like a rehearsal for his death, I said, but not so loud the he would hear me. Even I was appalled to hear it verbalized. But that’s how it felt. Still it makes no sense to feel this way – after all, I wrote a whole book that is basically a rehearsal for life without Jake. Did I think by writing about what will happen someday, that I have already dealt with the heartbreak I know is waiting for us? (The answer to this is, of course, yes).
I sat at the table, feeling belligerent. I’ll just sit here and have my coffee, I yelled to no one. It made as much sense as racing around not finding him. After all never in the history of searching for him has searching for him yielded results – Jake has always returned on his own, the mystery of where he was never solved.
Why was I so mad though? Did I really think I had a magic dog who would never do anything to worry me, including die?
Reader, I did.
Meanwhile the h was out trying to locate Jake with the Find My app – Jake now has an Air Tag. Five minutes later my phone rang.
The Find My app shows he’s up at the back of the property by the dumpsters, the h announced. More than a half mile from the house! How had he covered so much ground so fast?
I jumped up and raced up to help search – the back portion of the property is about 4 acres, with little valleys. You can’t see everything by standing in one spot, especially with all the lush growth of weeds from the winter rains we have yet to cut down.
The Find My app is misnamed – it should be called Approximately Find The Area Of The Tagged Item In a Radius. The app was telling us us to move around to locate him, so we did, splitting up – the h headed to the back of the property, me checking the eastern edge. Occasionally we came within shouting distance. In our stress we became snappish.
Why aren’t you answering your phone? the h hollered. I saw there were two missed calls. It was in my pocket, I hollered back. We need to be in communication! the h shouted. S-s-stop sh-sh-shouting at me, I screamed. It’s not helping! But I kept my phone in my hand as I searched.
After twenty more minutes of searching the h had to go back to the house to meet the electricians. I continued searching. Walking down a trail overgrown with weeds I came across the biggest pile of dung I’ve ever seen. A short distance later I found the producer, a white horse sitting placidly in the sun. I found another cavalo – a pony – on our property, but not Jake. I knew there was a third horse in the vicinity – they belonged to the Roma, encamped somewhere nearby. Ignoring the private property signs, they were grazing their animals on our land. I sighed, wondering if Jake had interacted with any of the three animals as he went on his walkabout, for they were standing on every path that led off the property.
I exited our property the way Jake would, at the back where the wall has almost completely crumbled and is easy to step over in places. I walked the neighborhood behind the property, a place Jake is fairly familiar with, though never off leash. The Find My app showed him within a half mile radius of where I was searching. Eu procura o meu cao, I told people. Um Labrador, a cor de chocolate, ele e velho.
I am looking for my dog, a Labrador the color of chocolate, he is old.
Everyone shook their heads, in a hurry to get to their cars or the bus stop. Morning rush hour was now underway.
Another half hour of fruitless searching and I was in real fear, not picturing a reunion, realizing, he may really be gone this time. My heart did not sink so much as freeze in my chest.
In the end it wasn’t the AirTags that helped us find Jake, but the fact the h engraved his phone number on a tag on Jake’s collar.
My phone rang. A lady called me, the h said. She has him. But I can’t understand her, she only speaks Portuguese. I’ll send you the number.
I called her and though she told me the street she was on, it didn’t help me much, I do not yet have a level of familiarity with the streets around us to recognize if the one she was naming was one that I knew, or was to the east or south or west of where I stood.
Eu nao entendo, I said, my voice breaking. Desculpe. Proxima Continente? I asked, without much hope. The grocery store is a good two miles from our house, an uphill walk through busy, winding streets. But it was a landmark that I could work with.
Sim, she said. Espere. Another voice came onto the phone.
You speak English? the voice said.
Yes, sim, obrigada, I said.
The woman spelled the street name, and I tried to plug it into Google Maps as we talked. But I was upset, and finding it difficult to navigate the conversation and two different apps.
The lady with your dog has to catch a bus, the voice said. You have to hurry.
Can she meet me at Continente? I asked.
A short conversation. Yes she can, but you must hurry, she has very little time. I was already running by this point. Eu corro, I said. Eu corro, obrigada!
There were old folks on park benches, and office workers getting into their parked cars, and kids walking to school with their parents. Everyone stared as I flew past the bus stops, going straight up the middle of the street to avoid the slippery sidewalk tiles, squeezing over when cars came past. The last quarter mile was up two short, steep hills. A couple of times my bad knee wobbled warningly but I ignored it; I went faster.
Once at Continente I circled the vast parking lot, went inside, back outside, circled again. The people at the outdoor cafe lingering over their pastel de nata and cafe stared at me; I was putting out a lot of energy for such an early hour.
I called the woman back. Estou para Continente agora, I gasped. After a brief back and forth, I spotted a slim gray haired woman at the far end of the parking lot nearest the exit to the highway, holding a large brown dog by the collar. The dog was looking up at her as they jogged, wagging.
Obrigada, obrigada, I told her, crying, immediately fastening Jake’s leash. He greeted me happily. The woman patted him; he licked her.
Queria te dar dinheiro? Can I give you money? Nao, nao, she said, smiling. Can I hug you? I asked in English, not knowing the Portuguese. Maybe she didn’t know English but she understood the tears streaming down my face well enough; she held out her arms.
Muito obrigado, I said again. She jogged off to her day. I turned to Jake; he avoided my eyes.
You know what you did, I said. We took off for home, Jake attempting to sniff around like it was a regular walk. Each time, I pulled his leash. No way, I said. This is not your morning walk, you already had that buster. We marched home, Jake slowing down – he was clearly hot and tired after his adventure. The sun was already warm at just before 9a. Jake had been missing for an hour and half.
At home, there were two vans in the driveway – the electricians had arrived. I saw a man headed up the road to the quinta with a length of white cord on his shoulder; the work was well underway. Jake drank for a long time at his bright yellow water bowl in the carport. I stood by the backdoor, pointing inside the house. Jake walked very slowly toward me, searching my face, his eyes hopeful. I respected his courage to look me in the face to check the emotional weather, but kept my face stern.
Inside, buster, I told him. He went immediately to his bed and lay down, ears in what we call the pontytail position, low and long, making his head look round. Usually I find this unbelievably cute, but today I could not be so easily persuaded to forgive and forget.
I texted the h over at the quinta with the electricians.We’re back. A relief emoji bloomed on the screen. My coffee was still on the table where I’d left it. It was cold but I drank it anyway.
A few minutes later the h entered the house and strode directly to Jake, whose eyes went from glad to guilty.
That was bad, the h said. He squatted down, looking Jake in the eye, and swatted his butt. Jake looked crushed.
Bad dog, the h repeated in a harsh voice. Jake’s head drooped, though he kept his eyes on the h’s face. I’d already expunged my emotion when I was reunited with Jake; the h was still flooding with the strange anger that comes after relief of that magnitude. It’s something I’ll be thinking about for awhile, this impulse for anger when in fear. How can I be, simultaneously, imagining finding my beloved boo and also kicking (not literally tho) his furry butt?
We spent a few minutes talking about the hows of Jake’s escape. While I was running back and forth trying to persuade the chickens to come to the coop, a task that took about fifteen minutes, Jake must have headed up to the quinta for his ritual morning greeting with Tiago. Then he continued past, walking up the road to the back of the cottage. It is quite literally “the high road” – a way to circumvent the closed gate on the staircase that leads up to the front of the cottage, and the barriers we placed .blocking the stone staircase leading to the back of the property. Those staircases are the most direct route to the back of the property; by taking the high road, Jake had bypassed all the barriers.
From there, he had the whole property at his disposal; based on the amount of time he was gone, he must have headed directly to the back of the property on the east side, where there is a set of dumpsters we often pass on our morning walks. Jake always shows a lot of interest in them, and I never let him linger, creating a magnetic pull that increases with every walk-by. Still, he couldn’t have lingered long – the lady that found Jake was a good mile away from that spot.
It’s still a mystery to me how he covered so much ground so quickly. I can picture it, Jake at a trot, head up and tail straight out as it is when he is interested and engaged. Did he wag at the people bustling to and fro on their morning business? Did cars stop for him as he crossed the road, or did he luck out and cross when there was no traffic? Did the women proprietors of the the clothing store and the laundry and the mini-mart see him sail past their doorways and wonder why they weren’t seeing the American woman that usually accompanied him?
Did the men seated at the cafes remark on him as he passed? Not many people where we live have dogs as large as Jake – people tend to be a bit afraid of him, and step out of his way, even when he wags and smiles. Did Jake beg them for pastries? (for surely he smelled them)
Did he stop to greet the driver of the produce delivery truck outside the criminal cafe (he surely did). When he reached the open fields and the busy streets around the grocery store, did he get scared, realizing he was in totally unfamiliar surroundings? Was he even trying to find his way back home, or was he just happily rambling? Or was he following the scent of his daddy, faint but traceable, on a walk we take once or twice a week? A dog’s nose is a hundred thousand times more sensitive than a human’s, able to detect a lump of sugar in an Olympic-sized swimming pool.
We’ll never know, I guess. Jake rests on the porch in a patch of sun as I write this, worn out from his adventure. The h walks out to intercept the mailman, and Jake stands to watch. The noon siren has gone off, a sound that always brings Jake running to me expecting lunch, but not today. Today he watches the h’s face, waiting for forgiveness. What were you doing out here, I hear the h murmuring to him. Where did you think you were going? Next time they call me what if I say oh no, that can’t be my dog, my dog is a good dog, he’d never be way up there, he doesn’t even have a Continente frequent shopper card! Jake sneezes, which he does when he is happy.
I should take you out behind the woodshed, the h says in a sweet voice. Jake woofs happily.