How Winston Came into My Life

It was a cold Tuesday morning in November. I was walking back from CVS after purchasing some cold medicine. As I made my way back home, I came to the corner of 34^th and Market Street in Philadelphia. For being eleven o’clock in the morning I thought it was odd that traffic was stopped in what appeared to be both directions.

As I observed my surroundings, my eyes fell upon a tiny white dog lying in the middle of the street. A man had just gotten out of his car and was approaching the little dog. Being frightened by the large man approaching him, the dog started to run away. Visibly limping, he ran in my direction and hid underneath a street cart.

Through the efforts of some other by-standers, we were able to get him out from underneath the cart. Someone provided a reusable grocery bag to place him in and held out the bag. “Who wants him?” he said. For what seemed like a very long time, there was silence between the five people who had helped to rescue the dog. Suddenly, I found myself saying, “I’ll take him!”

Ten minutes later I found myself on the side of the road, traffic moving freely again, with a dog in a bag. Holy smokes what had I just done? Before the full-on panic set in, I tried to formulate a plan. I knew the dog was injured and need medical assistance. Immediately, I called my best friend and roommate, Maddie, to come and pick me up.

We drove to University of Pennsylvania’s animal hospital. Looking back now, we must have looked incredibly foolish walking into an animal hospital, frantic and scared with a dog in a reusable grocery bag. I explained the situation to the receptionist. Her response was, “Well, we usually don’t take in stray dogs. Would you be willing to accept financial responsibility?” Oh no. That I had not thought of. I explained how much I would be willing to cover and the nurse took the dog in the bag away from me. Now the waiting game began.

After what felt like forever, the Doctor came out and told us all that she knew. The dog was a boy! She explained to us that he had three fractures in his pelvis. For being hit by a car, this was very good. If he had any fractures in his legs, he would have needed thousands of dollars in surgery. Other than the injuries to his pelvis and a few cuts and scrapes, he seemed to be in pretty good condition. He would have to be on crate rest for the next eight weeks.

Six hours after arriving at the hospital, we were sent home with a new dog!