My dog, Sparkle, went AWOL a few nights ago.  She’s back home where she belongs  now, and I’m being  vigilant about  making sure I know where she is at all times.

Here is the (almost) tragic tale.

It was a dark and gloomy night—okay, it was the latter part of the evening after a rainy afternoon.  I had gone shopping for much needed food. When I got home, we went for one of our walks. I was relaxing by playing my usual word games on the I PAD—a marvel of modern technology that allows a person to waste all sorts of time. I assumed (thus making an ass of –well, you know) that Sparkle, my delightful companion, was lying on the floor near where I was sitting.  I got up to stretch my legs and noticed that she was nowhere in sight.

“H-m-m,” I thought, “She must have gone to lie down on her doggie bed in my bedroom.” (I’m sure she thinks of it as her bedroom.)

She wasn’t there. I checked a couple of other known “dens”—no dog. Now I was worried.  So I called her name. I heard a faint bark coming from the garage area.

Heading that way, I wondered if she was hiding in the closet in the guest bedroom where she and Dan used to hangout.  No sign of her there, either.

When I opened the back door, I saw that I had left the door from the garage to the street wide open.

Then I saw it…Sparkle’s toy right next to my car which was parked in the garage!

And there is all her doggie glory was Sparkle—sitting on the grass. She must have followed me into the garage when I was unloading the groceries, and found herself locked out of the house.

I called her and she came right in.

After we were securely ensconced on the couch, she laid across my lap for a half hour, just wanting to be petted. I hope that she has learned her lesson.

I had a hard time getting to sleep that night thinking about all of the frightening things that could have happened: She could have been run over by a car, gone for a walk and gotten lost, been snatched by an alligator, been bitten by one of the many critters in our neighborhood…the list was unnerving.

I hope that the next time Sparkle decides to go AWOL, she’ll get a pass from her commander -in -chief–me!