Why You Should Never Eat In Cheap Retaurants

It was 14 degrees. At least that's what the neon sign on Lexington Avenue said. It was the dark of winter in New York, and I had just gotten off the 86 crosstown bus, home from working at a fish restaurant I hated. A stray dog stood in front of the bus as I got off and the bus dispatcher said he kept getting on the buses only to have each of the drivers take him off again. He was dirty and sad looking. Like many of the men I've met. I took him home. Like many of the men I've met.

I had a Yorkie who hated the big mutt immediately. I named him Panda because he looked like one. My dog's name was "Selfish and Spoiled", but I called him "My Boyfriend" for short.

I took Panda to a vet and the doctor discovered its previous owner had cut one of the dog's ears in HALF. With scissors. So I had him sewed up. I paid for his shots.

When I got home the restaurant called and fired me.

I had complained that the chefs kept throwing monkey dishes at our heads if we didn't pick up our orders fast enough. They also retrieved food from the floor and put it back on the stoves. But I was fired.

I had six dollars in the bank. I sat in a chair and cried while that mutt crawled up on my lap, put one paw on each of my shoulders and licked my tears. My own dog went to the kitchen and nosed his food dish around. To remind me that we could no longer afford dog food.

I had to find a new owner for the stray so I began walking my neighborhood with a big black and white mutt with half his head bandaged. One of those endless days, someone tapped me on the back and I turned around and saw an old woman dressed in multiple layers of clothes, endless accessories, a lack of makeup and frizzed out hair. I'd never seen her before and thought she might have been homeless.

I said "yes?" She said, "turn around." I turned back around and she took her right hand and made some chicken scratching movements on my upper back. When she stopped she said, "Don't worry, everything will work out. It will be fine."

I thanked her and started to walk away, relieved she hadn't asked for money I didn't have. But it occurred to me I hadn't asked her WHY everything was going to be okay so I turned back. She was nowhere to be seen. I lived on a very wide avenue, and there wasn't a lot of foot traffic on any given day because that part of the upper East side, by Gracie Mansion, was not accessible by subway, only bus or taxi. She had just vanished into thin air. And I never saw her again in the ten years I lived there after that incident.

The next day as I ONCE AGAIN walked with Panda, a woman came out of the flower shop on our street. She asked me why the dog was bandaged and I told her the story. She said she wanted a dog but her husband didn't and wouldn't let her get one. She called her husband and persuaded him to meet me and Panda later that day. When we arrived, Panda peed on the guy's shoes. The wife said, THIS IS OUR DOG!! The husband laughed and gave in and they took him. With a bandaged head.

I kept in touch with them for about a year. They kept Panda as the dog's name. They also discovered what my own vet had missed. That poor dog had 2 cut ears.

I got another job waiting tables not even a week later.

Things always do work out, even if it doesn't feel like it at the time.

And it NEVER feels like it at the time.