Sorry, I’m not feeling funny or witty today. I am totally without any of my warped sense of humor and sarcasm. Instead I’m writing to make a plea straight from the depths of my soul. I don’t get on my soapbox very often, because no one wants to read the rantings of people today and it seems that there is always someone ranting about something. And to be completely honest, no one cares about all the opinions out there. But once in a while, I can’t stop myself.

Today while walking the dogs, a very large pickup truck drove past us. It was a truck I’d not seen before, it was raised with a lift kit and had huge exhaust pipes coming out behind the cab and went straight in the air. He was driving slowly, which was a plus, but wouldn’t move over even a bit to make room for us. I had to step off the road and into the ditch, so we wouldn’t get knocked off the road. He went on by and I said my normal caustic statement about thoughtless morons.

As I walked on up the road I heard the truck getting louder and turned around to see that he had turned around and was heading back our way. I kept the dogs close as he drove past and that’s when it happened. He had a dog tied up in the back of the truck and the dog wanted to meet us, so he jumped up and out of the truck to come over to us. The line was long enough allow him to jump out and hit the ground, get whacked by the oversized tires, rolled under the truck and came to a stop in front of the tire. If the man hadn’t stopped, he would have run over his own dog.

I stood there and held onto my dogs calling out, “Oh my god!” The man opened his truck door, hopped out and walked back to the dog. He grabbed the dog by the harness and threw him back into the back of the truck, saying, “Stupid dog.” He turned and looked at me and said, “I’m sorry about that.” I called to him and asked if the dog was okay, knowing he didn’t care. The man just climbed back in the truck, shut the door and drove off. He was just far enough away that I couldn’t get the license number.

I stood there in shock, wanting to cry, wishing I could save that dog more than anything else in the world, but knowing that wasn’t going to happen. My heart broke a bit at the indifference and lack of humanity in the man.

So here is my plea. Please if you have a pickup truck or know someone that does, don’t ever put your dog in the back tethered or untethered. If the dog can’t go in the cab, he should be in a crate that is securely fastened to the back of the pickup truck and if that isn’t an option, then leave him at home.

I know I can’t save them all, but if I can make one person rethink putting their dog in the back of a pickup truck, then I guess that’s something.