New Hope for a New Year

By Lee Stephen

Although I am a fulltime author and publishing company CEO, literature is not my day job. I work for the Department of Emergency Preparedness in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana, where I serve as an emergency coordinator. My job is mostly mundane and occasionally frantic. It is almost always open-ended. By that, I mean that though I deal with many situations, I find out the results of very little. I receive many calls from many people in many different troubling circumstances. And almost every time, when I hang up the phone with them, it's the last I hear of their situation. I report auto accidents, never knowing who lived and who died. I report industrial injuries, never knowing if the person in question made it. During Hurricane Katrina, I report countless instances of lost and stranded family members. Of them all, I heard the result of just one—and only because I saw it on the news.

That changed on January 1st, 2008, when a simple story of hope became a source of inspiration.

On the previous evening—New Year's Eve—I received a phone call from a citizen. It was a report about a dog walking on the I-310 interstate bridge. According to the caller, it seemed that the dog must have fallen out of a vehicle. She was afraid it would cause a wreck. As is my procedure, I contacted the local Sheriff's Office immediately, and a deputy was sent to locate the animal. The report came back negative, and it could only be assumed that the dog wandered off of the bridge and disappeared into the wetlands. Ninety percent of the time, this would have been the end of the story.

About an hour later, I received a disheartened phone call from a citizen. He asked if I had heard anything about a small female pit bull loose on the I-310 bridge. Of course, I had. He then went on to explain that the pit bull, whom he called "Sugar," was a neglected dog he had rescued. Unable to keep the dog himself, but not wanting the unfortunate animal to be euthanized, he had been attempting to find the animal a home. He explained that Sugar was one of the sweetest, gentlest dogs he had ever seen. He was even able to feed it by hand. He had finally found Sugar a good home, and he was driving her to her new family. While on top of the I-310 bridge, his truck was hit by a violent gust of wind, as often happens. Sugar's kennel flew out of his truck bed. Unable to stop on the bridge, he had no choice but to continue along the interstate until he was able to turn back around. By the time he got to the fallen kennel, Sugar was gone.

The gentle dog he'd fought so hard to save was now lost and alone. He searched for several more hours, walking the roads and woods and calling her name to no avail. Occasionally, he called me to find out if anyone had reported her. No one had. With a cold New Year's night approaching, he had no choice but to give up his search.

The more you deal with situations, the more hardened your emotions become. But having rescued an abused animal of my own—a White German Shepherd—I knew exactly how the man must have felt. I knew the wonderful feeling of rescuing a poor animal, and the consequent gentleness one finds in such a neglected dog, almost as if they realize what you've done for them. I remember being initially unable to tell my fiancée of the story. It was simply too painful to recollect.

Ninety-five percent of the time, this would have been the end of the story.

Enter New Year's Day. I arrive at work at 0700 in the morning to start my twelve-hour shift. It is not long after I arrive at work that I receive another phone call, again from the citizen in search of his dog. He asked if I'd heard anything, and I told him I hadn't. I remember wishing inwardly that somehow, this story would have a happy ending. I thought of how horrible a start to 2008 it must have seemed for the man. I could hear the disheartenment in his voice. In describing her to me again, he couldn't help but repeat the words, "she's so very gentle," and, "she's so very sweet." He finally sighed, and told me that if anyone reported a man in an orange cap walking along the interstate, not to worry. It was only him.

Ninety-nine percent of the time, this would have been the end of the story.

I remember the moment I got the phone call. I was in the kitchen of the place I work, when the phone rang, and I dutifully picked up the mounted wall phone. I stated my name and agency, as I do every work day, over and over again. As always, I wondered what kind of unfortunate situation I'd have to coordinate. After all, nobody calls emergency preparedness for something good.

He didn't even say who he was, but he didn't have to. The moment I heard him speak, I knew exactly who I was talking to.

"I found her!"

It was the man in search of his dog—the dog he'd lost on an interstate bridge the evening before. He had searched everywhere. He had walked through grassy fields and on the sides of roads. He had walked on the outskirts of Louisiana wetlands and beneath an interstate bridge, calling her name over and over without success. But today, success found him. Sugar was within a hundred yards from where he happened to park—in the opposite direction.

"I thought she was a pile of garbage in the distance," he said, "until she lifted her head when I called her name." She was on the other side of a small canal. He waded across waist-deep water in forty-degree weather to get her back.

I could hear the joy beaming from his voice, and though I'd never seen this man before in my life, I couldn't help but visualize a smile stretching across his face, from one ear to the next. Truth be told, I was smiling that wide, too. He told me how excited Sugar was to see him, and how she ran to him and almost leapt in his arms. Sugar was safe again.

I knew what the eventual outcome of the story would be. He had been searching for a home for Sugar because he was unable to keep her himself. Soon, he would wave goodbye to her as she went to a new family of her own. But I knew he'd never forget her. She wouldn't forget him, either. You can see a picture of Sugar, kindly donated by the owner, at the top of this newsletter.

As an author, it is my job to come up with fantastic situations. It is my job to make up miracles. But as I've come to learn so many times before, nothing compares to the real miracles of life. It seemed amazingly appropriate that, on the last day of 2007, a man and his lost dog seemed all but without hope, only to find that the first day of 2008 brought them back together.

There are ups and downs in every part of life. I know this myself all too well. This experience serves as a lesson to all of us. Never let an impossible situation bring you too far down to come up for air. Hope could be a moment away.

May 2008 bring hope to us all.