while you wait

There's always something to see while you wait at the bottom of your driveway for a timed delivery that turns out to be "temporarily delayed" after you've already been waiting for 45 minutes in the heat and bugs.

First I saw a butterfly enjoying the Philadelphus flowers.

Then I saw a young girl with a dog on a lead, a cellphone in her hand, and socks on her feet, standing on the pavement by a telephone pole. The dog appeared to be one that was posted as missing back in April, the cellphone was being used to call the number on the Missing Dog poster on the telephone pole, and I don't know about the socks. I'm not going to ask a teenager why she or he is wearing anything, because it doesn't seem all that long ago since people were asking me that question and even then I thought life was too short for such discussions.

Anyway, when the owner on the poster did not answer the phone or respond to the 18 back-to-back voicemails the girl left for him (I don't know why), I called our town Animal Control Officer who I know very well, because the girl seemed reluctant to leave the dog with me (I did offer a couple of times) and she had already called the Animal Control person in the next town over (again, I don't know why) but also did not want to hand the dog over to that person, should that person arrive (see above parentheses for developing trend).

Ah, there were many questions in the air, that hour at the bottom of my driveway.

And there still are, because when my friend the Animal Control Officer for our own town showed up, she had big doubts that this was the "right" dog, from the Missing Dog poster. My gosh, plot twist! But she very kindly took control of the situation, assured the girl that the dog would be happy and comfortable while things got sorted out, and popped the pup into her car and out of the sun and biting bugs.

And I said goodbye to the nice girl from up the road who caught - if not "the" missing dog, at least "a" missing dog - and took the trouble to try to get it back to it's home.

And then I saw the butterfly again.

And eventually my delivery showed up.

The End.

~~~~~