Sammy Alley

Every day I take my dog for a walk, and we head down Sammy Alley. Sammy Alley is the unofficial name of the narrow passage about a block from our house. We named it that because toward the end of her life, it was all the further Sammy could make it on her walks.

Bailey is of course much quicker and much more curious about his stroll down this lane every day. He knows when we reach the intersection of the sidewalk and the alley, we take the alley, and he leads me down the path, his ears perking up when he sees a bunny, head cocking as he stops to sniff some flowers. It’s near the beginning of the walk, so Bailey is always ahead of me on Sammy Alley, unlike the end of the walk where he has to work a little harder to keep up with me.

It’s kind of strange to have a dog walking way ahead of me down this stretch of street. Sammy was always lagging behind, hobbling along, her arthritis clearly bothering her to the point where people who crossed our paths would comment on the “old girl” doing the best she could to get her daily exercise.

At the beginning of Sammy Alley is an unkempt tiny yard belonging to one of our neighbors. Two cats live at that house and we always look to see if they are outside when we take our walks. Most of the time they are. They have a little cat door and they can come and go as they please. The curious thing about these cats is that I’ve never seen them out of their little yard. One of them is always on the bench and the other is always on the sidewalk. Sometimes it’s just one of them, and the striped one is out more than the calico, but they never leave the yard. I smile and say hello and if they acknowledge me at all, it’s only to give me an annoyed look and send me on my way.

Halfway down there is a pumpkin patch. I’ve been watching the pumpkins grow all year. This part of the alley is never at a loss for bunnies. It is here that I have been able to practice teaching Bailey not to chase bunnies. I never had to think about that with Sammy. She wasn’t interested in chasing bunnies. She was just trying to get around the block.

Three-quarters of the way down is a garage and more bunnies and at the end of the lane there is an overly rambunctious Irish Setter who invariably runs to the end of his fence, jumping and barking at Bailey, just like he did with Sammy. Both of my dogs always responded by eyeing the dog, tails wagging.

Today as Bailey and I were nearing the end of Sammy Alley, I stopped and took a picture. It is the perfect picture of Sammy Alley on a cool autumn afternoon, the sun shining brightly from heaven onto a world that’s about to go into another season.

I didn’t know it on all those walks that I took with Sammy, but it is right here in this location that I learned to love dogs. I never really wanted to walk her every day but I felt it was my duty on the evenings Brian was otherwise occupied with golf. Somewhere in all that pulling and coaxing her around the block, somewhere on those walks where she would just decide she was no longer going to walk and instead she was going to sit down right where she was and let us get the wagon for her, somewhere in all that waiting for her as she plodded along, I fell in love with Sammy. She will always be the dog that turned me into a dog lover and made me realize something I was missing all my life.

As I stood there and snapped a picture of it today with Bailey by my side looking up at me almost like he was smiling, I knew he would never really know the significance of the alley we just walked through. But he will know the end result for the rest of his life. Every day he will know that I love him. Every day I will be thankful that I rescued him from a life of neglect and abuse and brought him into a home filled with love. And we both have Sammy to thank for that.

Maybe someday everyone in the neighborhood will know this little lane as Sammy Alley and the legend could live on years after we are gone. But for now, I’m OK with knowing it my heart and thinking of her every time my dog turns down the lane at the beginning of our walk.