It’s all his fault

Teddy and meWe love having the opportunity to travel with our dogs. And we’re fortunate that they’re all terrific in the car.

Never utter a peep. Which is why, on my (Hope’s) recent road trip, I didn’t notice until a mid-afternoon potty break (for me and the dogs!) that Teddy had been bitten by something and his face was swelling up.

Teddy has had a couple of allergic reactions over the years, so I always have some Benadryl with me in the dog-travel-box. I gave him a dose and decided there wasn’t anything else I could do at the time, other than to continue to our destination and check him every half hour/45 minutes.

Which is why we wound up having a very difficult afternoon. It’s all Teddy’s fault.

The six-lane highway we were traveling on was completely stopped. Apparently there was an accident up ahead. All I could see was an endless line of cars and semi-trucks, all stopped dead. For over an hour.

Since we weren’t moving, I was able to check on Teddy. He was fine – breathing normal, swelling and redness next to his nose already starting to subside.

When we finally got moving again – and I have absolutely no idea why we’d stopped, because the highway was entirely clear by the time we got to wherever it had been – we motored along happily until our next Teddy check.

It wound up being only about 30 miles from our destination, but I thought it was important to check him on schedule. He was fine.

But he was also why we were where we were when we were – where I really, really, would rather not have been.

Back on the highway, a big, white SUV went racing by in the lane to the left. Then it cut me off, zooming for what he/she thought was an exit, and turned out to be a truck weigh station. He must have been going over 100 mph. When he saw it wasn’t an exit, zoomed back, cutting me off and racing down the highway – with three police cruisers now in pursuit.

I could see the police closing in and the SUV attempting to weave in and out of traffic, finally skidding out of control, hitting the center barrier, and spinning back across all three lanes of traffic. The three police cars surrounded it – stopped any which way on the highway.

Meanwhile, all the non-involved traffic (like me!) was trying to figure out which lane to be in, how slow we should be going, which lane we could creep by the debris, and how to let three lanes condense into one shoulder-creeping line without anyone else being smushed.

I saw one of the officers grab the SUV driver’s door open – but I couldn’t see anything inside other than the side air bag had deployed.

Much too much excitement – and it was all Teddy’s fault.

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