domestic crisis, canine variety

Allan and I both work long hours on the weekend. A dogwalker comes in to take care of Cody and Tala.

I get home first. When I came home last Saturday, the place looked exactly as when we left in the morning.

Tala is crated when we're not home. She was very agitated, which is unusual, then she zoomed outside and immediately "did both", also very unusual.

I had a weird feeling that D, the dogwalker, hadn't been in. But I kept telling myself that she wouldn't do that. She's been so reliable and responsible. Had the dogs eaten? Should I feed them?

I was concerned but I just kept debating with myself, was she here or wasn't she. I called and emailed but didn't hear anything. On Sunday morning I left a note and D's money.

When I came home on Sunday, the note and the money were still there, untouched! Now I knew the dogs had been alone all weekend, and hadn't eaten on Saturday.

To compound my guilt, Tala was in a funnel collar - we're trying to get a sore to heal - and she's not very happy in her crate with the collar on. So she was stuck in her crate for 12 hours - something I would never do - two days in a row. And she hadn't eaten the first day! I felt terrible.

And just for good measure, I had a horrible night at work on Sunday (also unusual). So when I came home to this, I was really upset.

Where is D?? She is a single mom of a small child, and has dogs of her own. She has always seemed so responsible and reliable. I keep thinking something must have happened to her or her baby to cause her not to show up. (But why couldn't she have called? Even if there's a crisis, at some point you can find two minutes to call and say you can't make it...) We are confused and worried about her.

You know when you don't know whether to be worried or angry? Of course I hope nothing happened, but if I find out that's true, I'll be furious.

A friend suggested we call the police. It's not an unreasonable idea. "Didn't show up for work" is often how missing people are reported. But D is very close with her mom, who does a lot of child care for her. If D is actually missing, her mother is already aware of it.

I have a new ad on Craigslist (how I found D and her predecessor), and I'm reasonably sure I'll be able to find someone to start next weekend. This weekend, friends of ours are going to come over (thank you thank you thank you). If we couldn't find anyone to do that, we were going to take turns calling in sick. (Uh, no one from work reads this, right?)

We took the dogs to the park both Monday and Tuesday to make up for their crappy weekend. Of course they bounced back much faster than me. Canines are much better at that than humans, with our ridiculous brains.

But where is D?