You've all seen them. You may have one, yourself...or two...because they're so tiny.
She was standing on the sidewalk in front of a bar. It was eleven A:M. She looked to be in her early sixties. Her skin was pallid. Her hair, firecracker cut. She wore a bright yellow rain slicker over a dowdy blue print dress and sat recklessly, teeter tottering on the seat of her electric scooter. She was smoking a cigarette and around the wrist of that hand, was a leash.
And there, on the end of the leash was one of those small dogs. It's fur was long and windblown. Its tongue was sticking out. It was being choked. The poor thing couldn't get into a comfortable place because the smoking woman was holding her hand up too high.
She was staring at the swirling smoke, perhaps seeing images. I was sitting behind a stalled, battered truck in the middle of thick, pea soup traffic. The truck's engine was turning over and over, the driver, I guess, panicking.
I rolled down my window and whistled. She never moved. That's when I saw.
Her eyes were glazed. She was somewhere, but not...there. I don't know where. The dog was there too. Both needed the other. One for food. The other for a collar to cry on.
The dog kept struggling, trying to get more air, even if it was nicotined. The woman kept yanking up the leash to get a better suck on her cig. She had those desperate fish lips, that some addicted smokers get - puckered, anticipating the smooth death curl down the windpipe. I was about to get out of my car and race over to her when the truck in front of me suddenly jumped to life just as the drivers behind me were getting antsy and starting to punch their fists on their horns.
There was nowhere to go but forward.
She was standing on the sidewalk in front of a bar. It was eleven A:M. She looked to be in her early sixties. Her skin was pallid. Her hair, firecracker cut. She wore a bright yellow rain slicker over a dowdy blue print dress and sat recklessly, teeter tottering on the seat of her electric scooter. She was smoking a cigarette and around the wrist of that hand, was a leash.
And there, on the end of the leash was one of those small dogs. It's fur was long and windblown. Its tongue was sticking out. It was being choked. The poor thing couldn't get into a comfortable place because the smoking woman was holding her hand up too high.
She was staring at the swirling smoke, perhaps seeing images. I was sitting behind a stalled, battered truck in the middle of thick, pea soup traffic. The truck's engine was turning over and over, the driver, I guess, panicking.
I rolled down my window and whistled. She never moved. That's when I saw.
Her eyes were glazed. She was somewhere, but not...there. I don't know where. The dog was there too. Both needed the other. One for food. The other for a collar to cry on.
The dog kept struggling, trying to get more air, even if it was nicotined. The woman kept yanking up the leash to get a better suck on her cig. She had those desperate fish lips, that some addicted smokers get - puckered, anticipating the smooth death curl down the windpipe. I was about to get out of my car and race over to her when the truck in front of me suddenly jumped to life just as the drivers behind me were getting antsy and starting to punch their fists on their horns.
There was nowhere to go but forward.
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