stuck in a bike

I wonder how long she'd been there.

Yesterday, I rushed downstairs to see her and let her out the downstairs back door. But I hadn't opened the upstairs back door, so I blocked the staircase with a chair and made her lie down while I ran around to the front door and through the house to find that she was still lying down where I had put her.

Later, I went to the store and bought some baby gates to block both sides of the steps.

Today, plan in hand, I rushed through the front door, grabbed a baby gate, headed to the back door and the steps, where I planned on putting the gate up, leaving the door open, and then rushing downstairs to see her when I heard a little barking. I stopped dead in my tracks, listened hoping that it was coming from the park outside. When I heard it again, my heart stopped because I knew it was coming from downstairs.

I ran downstairs calling her, saying "it's ok", and I couldn't find her.

I ran through the rec room, the library/ foosball room, and the bathroom before she barked again. And that's how I found her. Stuck in a bicycle. Her left front leg was jammed between the peddle and the gear shaft. The gear shaft was pressing into her chest. Her hind legs were collapsing underneath her. That they hadn't collapsed already made me think this hadn't been going on for very long.

I was afraid I was going to break her little leg when I pulled it free, and she restrained herself from biting me. Such trust.

Then she started to struggle, but she was still threaded through the bike. She rolls off her butt now, and falls on her side. I grabbed her neck and chest and held her, calmed her, while i pulled the bike free, then let her slide to the ground.

I let her stay there for fifteen minutes. She seemed comfortable, but I had to know if she was hurt, and I have to force feed her every hour until bedtime, so I got her up. She leaned against me, her hind legs tangled and crossed. I helped her straighten out and lead her outside where she just stood still looking out into the park.

After a little while, she ventured off the patio for a poop, and then started wandering, a little aimlessly around the yard, showing interest in going out the back gate. It's been a long while since she wanted to go outside, let alone out the back gate. So, I ran and grabbed her leash, just as I was calling DH to tell him that she'd survived a dangerous situation with the bike.

He wanted be to be cautious going out the back gate that the expletive deleted jerk whose dog attacked Bailey in September wasn't around. I told him that I'd just pick her up if she was in danger, not to worry.

Bailey let the walk. First the few feet down the trail to the bike path, where she just stood and looked around. Eventually she walked over the path and pee-ed on the other side. The stood and looked toward the bridge like she was ready to go.

"OK" I said. And she began a slow walk up the path. She was panting a bit. And we walked quite a ways, a tiny portion of our regular walks. But far enough for me to stop and ask "Just how far are we going? Huh?" She stopped for a while and looked around. "I think we'd better go back, ok?" and we slowly turned around and headed back to the bridge.

I heard little footsteps behind me as we neared the bridge. Little steps trying to catch up with us on the gravel path, and there was a little girl, like so many other children, who saw Bailey and wanted to pet her. But Bailey had stopped on the bridge and wandered over to the edge to look about. The little girl and her young mom caught up with us on the bridge, and the mom said "Oh, my, she's an old girl isn't she?"

And I said "well, she wasn't a few months ago." And the tears welled up as the walked away.

We were just a few feet away from the trail that leads to our back gate, but it took a long while to get there. Half-way up the short trail, Bailey started to wretch, and my phone rang.

When we moved in we had over 50 azalea bushes. We transplanted all the ones with neon colors to my mom's house. We have about ten that are this salmon color, Rolf's favorite. We even happened to bring five of them from our other house. I've still got two huge neon pink bushes in the front, next to the front door. We're going to kill those and maybe move these up there instead. Notice that you can still see a little bit of the lake. Any day now, you won't be able to see it at all.