A dog doesn’t care if you’re rich or poor, smart or dumb. Give him your heart…and he’ll give you his.
—Milo Gathema
May 23, 2016 - Garland Wood, one of our Calvary Baptist Church members, has two treasured Chihuahua dogs, “Dee Dee” and her brother, “Dexter”. They’re 12 years old but you’d never know it by looking at them. When I arrived at church last week, everyone was gathered around Gar. He had driven to Shelbyville the day before (Saturday) and had taken Dee Dee and Dexter with him. When he returned home, he couldn’t believe his eyes when he discovered that Dee Dee was no longer in the truck. Gar hastily drove back to Shelbyville…looking and calling… but saw no sign of his little dog. “I couldn’t sleep last night because of the storm we had… she’s horrified of bad weather and will shiver and shake when it thunders…I could just see her cold and huddled up along some dark road somewhere”. Pam said, “Gar, don’t be surprised if she finds her way home”. “That would surprise me”, he replied. Gar made two trips every day back to Shelbyville asking questions and placing pics in the stores but saw no signs of Dee Dee.
Monday morning Pam sent pics of Dee Dee to local papers and Facebook with the hope that someone might see her and we finally got a call on Tuesday morning. A lady from Tenaha, Texas said she saw a little dog that looked a lot like Dee Dee near her home that morning. “Let’s go”, I told Pam. “We can be there in thirty minutes.” As we raced out to the car, Pam shouted out, “Wait….Look!” …. And to our total surprise, walking up our driveway was Gar…with Dee Dee embraced safely in his arms! “I was driving to the Post Office a while ago,” he smiled, “and met her heading straight for home!” “I would have loved to have seen the look on your face when you saw her”. I replied. “You should have seen her eyes when she saw me”, Gar laughed. “She almost licked me to death!”. She looked good considering her four day ordeal and made little joyful sounds as if she was trying to tell us what had happened. We called Gar later that evening and he said things were already back to normal. “The dogs are playing together and went with me for my walk in the woods as they do every day”.
Dee Dee was gone four days. How did she find her way home from a place 17 miles away and one she’d ever been? Did she follow the paved roads or did she make her way through woods and fields? Did she rest at night? Since she can’t talk, none of us will ever know the answer to those questions.. But Dee Dee knows…
…….and it will always be her little secret.
It’s known that animals have the ability to make a sort of “map” in their mind of landmarks, scents, sounds and familiar territory. It’s believed pets are sensitive to the earth’s magnetic fields and this gives them the ability to know which direction they’re going by using an inner compass. But the question still remains, how do they know which way to go? No one knows, t researchers do know if magnets are attached to a dog or cat, the homing ability is taken away.
