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.
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