Rob 4 Now in the Neighborhood

My husband and I have lived in this house over thirty years, during which time I’ve watched the neighborhood change in the usual ways—older folks moving on and younger families moving in, new houses on once-empty lots, repaved streets and new sidewalks, and more trees. I knew my immediate neighbors and knew about others farther out. But since our beloved dog died in May 2018, I’ve expanded my view of this community.

My husband prefers the name Rob for every dog, so we’re now on Rob 4. But before that he bonded so completely with Rob 2 that we were both devastated when he died. He was a rescue dog who was four or five years old when we got him, from a foster parent who thought we were too old for him. He was sweet, good-natured, and rarely ate my shoes. But he was a handful. When he died, we tried replacing him but Rob 3 bit someone, and needed massive amounts of training, which we helped arrange. The crisis included a broken arm for my husband, followed by PT. It also meant waiting quite a while for his arm to heal before getting another dog.

For the last twelve months people have stopped him every day, sometimes three or four times a day, asking about Rob 2 and Rob 3 and his arm. These people are sometimes neighbors down the street, at the other end of the neighborhood, from across town, or out of town. But all saw him walking the dog day and night (and that means sometimes at three in the morning). Where was the dog, what happened to Rob 2, and when will there be a new one? (My favorite was a young woman who turned her car around and came back to say, My mother wants to know about your dog.)

Well, we’ve had Rob 4 less than two weeks, and now I know what Michael was going through. I walk the dog occasionally, and almost every time someone asks, Is this Rob 4? Young men in their twenties stop mowing the lawn to take a look, women wave from across the street, and men and women slow down while driving past so they can ask, Is this Rob 4? Smiles and waves follow.

Who are these people? I’ve never seen most of them before, and I had no idea so many people were following the ongoing saga of my husband and his dog. They all seem to know who I am, but even so, I’m thinking of getting a t-shirt suggested by a friend, which would read: 

Susan 1

Mother of Rob 4

What does this have to do with crime fiction and writing? Well, if you insist . . . 

Consider how hard criminals try to conceal what they’re up to, and consider the number of people (probably in the hundreds by now) who kept track of a man whose last name they didn’t know while he recovered from a broken arm and searched for a new rescue dog. It’s enough to make an honest person out of anyone considering a life of crime.