A kind of wonderful thing
On Saturday afternoon, Steven was driving with me and my aunt when we came across what seemed like a traffic jam on the highway. In Waterloo, Iowa.
I was immediately confused, and worried about what might be the cause of the jam. It’s not like traffic congestion is a big thing there, like it is here in Chicagoland. I figured we were going to see some horrible accident.
But the traffic jam was different… when we first got to it, it was three cars in each lane, on a three lane highway, but that were slowing moving together. And people kept running back and forth from side to side of the highway, in front of all the cars. Huh?
As we slowly drove through it, we could see that the people out of their cars were chasing something, along the concrete highway barrier (that separates the two directions of traffic). We couldn’t tell what it was until we drove past – a small dog.
As we drove past, I looked back and saw that people would run after the dog, it would get way ahead on the highway, and then the person would stop running, get in their car, and drive forward some more to try to catch it. And then all the cars would move forward. Like it was orchestrated.
People were being so understanding.
After watching another person chase then give up, I said to Steven, “I think they need a runner to catch this thing,” so we pulled over and I ran back toward all the cars. Down the middle of the highway.
But by the time I got there, there were many people out of their cars, trying to catch it, and many more cars stopped. Now the dog was darting back and forth along the highway, underneath people’s (thankfully stopped!) cars. Yikes!
Steven took this photo while I was trying to help with the dog. When we showed it to my parents later, they saw their car was in the photo!
The dog finally stopped under the car in the front middle lane and everyone got down to try to get him out. Someone tried to coerce him with pizza. No dice. Someone tried to grab at him. He backed up even more to the center of the car. We had the driver slowly back up his car, the dog slowly backed up too.
Then someone grabbed a ladder out of his truck, to gently nudge the dog. Then the same person offered his mechanic’s gloves, because the dog was scared, and biting the person trying to grab him. All this time, there were five people trying to get this dog out from under the car. I was laying, on the highway, in front of a car. Something I didn’t think I would be doing that day!
Eventually, we got the dog out, and the driver of the car he was under wrapped him up against his chest, with his coat. At that point, I left – I wasn’t much help to begin with, and figured the dog would get back to his owner. I assumed that the owner had to be there, that it wasn’t just strangers trying to help a loose animal.
But I wasn’t done thinking about the situation, after we left. I was just astonished by how cooperative everyone was – the people in the cars, waiting to get through, and all of the different people, working together, to try to save the poor dog. It was amazing to see a bunch of strangers come together for something like that. It reminds you there is still good in the world! (Of course, I realize how dangerous it was, and was thinking about this story.)
I was wrong when I assumed his owner was there though. I later learned, via my sister and older brother, who saw a post about this dog on Facebook, that his owner was in an accident about three miles away, and that the dog (Marco) ran away during the accident and they had no idea where he was! They found him, with a broken leg, near where we saw him on the highway. I am not sure if that information got to the owner via Facebook, or if he had a collar on and they called (I don’t remember seeing one), but that’s another good reminder of something Facebook is good for!
What a day!
Aww, and speaking of wonderful things, I have to share something about Furious 7, which is what we were coming from seeing, when we came across this incident in the highway.
NOTE: MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW, SO SKIP IF YOU DON’T WANT TO READ THEM!
I was really curious what they were going to do with Paul Walker’s character in this movie. As you probably know, he passed away while this movie was being filmed. The cast took a break from filming, to re-work the script a bit, then when they came back to it, had Walker’s two brothers do the scenes, and had Paul’s face digitally added (from what I understand, anyway).
So during the entire movie I thought they were going to kill his character off. I was sure of it. There were even a few scenes that lead you to believe it!
But they didn’t! And then at the end, there was this discussion about how things will be different in the future (movies) because Paul Walker’s character is going to focus on his family now, and then Vin Diesel said some touching stuff about him, that fit in the story, but you know it was about Paul, in real life.
Gawd, I was all choked up. For a movie that is about fast cars and criminals, they nailed this tribute to Paul Walker. I know it can seem cheesy in the movies, that they are always pushing their “friends are family,” theme (and Diesel’s character says it again in this movie “I don’t have friends, I have family”) but that’s always meant a lot to me, because we have friends that are family, and the movies remind me of that (minus of course, the fast cars, breaking the law, world-wide travel, guns, and so on). And it seems like these actors were really friends – come on, Diesel named his newborn daughter Paulina! Anyway. It was touching. And well done. And I am happy they didn’t kill his character.
And, to be honest, I didn’t feel as sad about Paul Walker’s death when it happened, as I did after that movie. When it happened, I was overwhelmed by people being sensational about it – talking about it because he was a celebrity; talking about it because it was a thing to talk about. After seeing Diesel talk about naming his daughter Paulina on a talk show last week, then seeing their emotions in this film, I really felt the sadness of what that loss meant to his loved ones. That made it much more real to me.
Themocracy
That is so neat. It is nice to see people coming together for a good cause instead of just yelling at each other and honking because of the traffic.
My first thought is that dogs are awesome, so of course someone would try to save that one. But that’s not always how things work, so that is seriously cool so many people were slowing down and stopping to help! And even better that the dog was reunited with its owner, awww 🙂
That’s such a wonderful story about everyone coming together to help rescue that poor dog. I’m glad you were able to find the end of the story and that he made it safely home to his owners.
That is a lovely and scary story about the dog. Poor little guy running in traffic that far from an accident is something, he is lucky to be reunited with his owner.
Oh that poor doggy. I bet he was so scared! I’m so glad that everyone was able to work together to rescue him. You’re right that it certainly could have ended differently!
Could you tell in the movie any parts where it was digitized to add Paul Walker in or did they do a good job of it? I can only imagine the work it took to do that!
Yeah, I was just thinking about how out here, it would have been SO dangerous to stop on the highway, and that people might not have even seen it 🙁
I couldn’t tell! Steven said he could in the last scene, but I thought they did an excellent job! 🙂
I think once you get outside of the city/suburbs, people are generally much nicer. Don’t get me wrong, there are nice people everywhere, but it’s just different. I’m glad the dog was ok.
That is so awesome! I love stories like that, make me proud to be a native Iowan….glad everyone made it out of the situation safe though. I always tell people – Iowa may not be the most exciting place, but the people are awesome.
That is definitely what I was thinking 🙂
Yay!!! I’m so glad they were able to get that poor pup off the highway! I love stories that end well like that. And even better people were being patient waiting while others tried to coerce the dog to a safe place. 🙂
I’m going to skip the FF stufd for now because I’ll probably watch it with L. 🙂
This gives me warm fuzzies! It’s good that they caught the dog and that everyone was on the same page. That keeps everyone safe!
Aww, so sweet that everyone stopped for a dog, and even better that the dog was reunited with the owners later! I love it!! At the beginning of your story, I had a feeling it was an animal, and I thought it was going to be a cow. LOL!
I’m a sucker for a good dog story with a happy ending! I’ve got one laying on my laptop right now, terrified of thunder. Awww..
Wow, that poor dog! He must have been so freaked out, but what an amazing story that everyone came together to get him! That really warms my heart. And good for you for jumping right in!! I’m glad that story ended well.
And, oh man, I know what you mean about F7. I won’t write any more so that I don’t spoil anything, but we can discuss tomorrow. 😀
So much awesomeness in this post! I was almost crying reading about the dog!
But more superficially, about Furious 7: We saw it this weekend too and I had very similar reactions to you–both at the time of his death (I was like “do people REALLY give a $h*t about this guy?!?!?!”) and then after the movie. I was cringing during the high action scenes w/PW thinking “this is going to be it” (and apparently Matt was too) and was really glad that his character made it to the end. For whatever reason it felt more like it was justice to him as a person to have it that way. I haven’t done a whole lot of reading about the extent that they had to remaster the script and/or images and am curious to read more.
It sounds like we had the exact same reaction! I wonder if they would show more of that behind the scenes stuff on the DVD extras or if that would be in bad taste. I am curious about it!
Poor dog! He must have been so scared.
Glad you like the movie. I want to see it too. I saw Cinderella on Monday and LOVED it. It was so much better than I expected.