By J. H. Irwin
Author | Storyteller | Capturing Life, Memory, and Meaning
Two days ago as I sat in line at the Walgreens drive-through, I noticed a man pushing a shopping cart through the parking lot. Inside were what appeared to be his worldly belongings. Two bed pillows rested across the top of the cart, and on the rack beneath it sat a dog bed. Trailing slightly behind him was a dog on a leash, what looked to be a golden retriever mix.
The man was fairly young, likely in his mid-to-late thirties. He was well groomed and decently dressed, and the expression on his face did not appear to be one of despair. There was something closer to contentment in the way he looked, although I knew nothing about what he might actually have been feeling. His dog also appeared healthy, well cared for, and happy to be going wherever they were going. Together, they were a team.
As I watched them pass, I found myself imagining their story. Had he lost his job and, eventually, his home and car? Had a series of difficult circumstances brought him to this parking lot, pushing what remained of his possessions ahead of him? He didn’t strike me as someone who had given up, and I wondered what he was working his way through, or toward.
My first thought was that he didn’t look like the homeless people I was accustomed to seeing. But that thought deserves a little examination, too. What was I expecting hardship to look like? A person does not have to appear defeated for life to have become difficult, and someone whose struggle is more visible is no less deserving of being seen with compassion.
The truth is, I didn’t even know whether he was homeless. The shopping cart and its contents suggested it, but suggestion is not knowledge. I was watching a few moments of someone’s life from the comfort of my car, filling in the enormous spaces between what I could see and what I could not possibly know.
Still, my eyes kept returning to the dog bed. Among the belongings he was transporting was something specifically meant for his companion’s comfort. I couldn’t know what decisions had gone into packing that cart, but I could see that the dog had a place in it. Not just a leash connecting him to the man, but a bed being carried along for wherever they might stop.
That small detail tugged at my heart. Anyone who has loved a dog will probably understand why. We know what it means to make room for them, to think about whether they are comfortable, whether they have what they need. Seeing that familiar care in circumstances so different from my own made the man feel less like a stranger whose story I was trying to guess and more like someone with whom I already shared something.
I wondered what comfort the dog offered him in return. Was he the familiar presence through a stretch of unfamiliar days? Someone to wake up beside, someone to care for, someone whose company made an uncertain afternoon a little less lonely? Those were questions I couldn’t answer, but there was something moving about watching the two of them make their way through the parking lot together.
I hoped they had somewhere safe to go. If they were struggling, I hoped there would be help that allowed them to remain together. They had to remain together. I felt like I should have offered something, and I wanted to, but I remembered other times when an offer of help had been met with a firm “no.” That memory made me hesitate. It’s a touchy dance, wanting to reach out without making assumptions about someone’s circumstances or what they need. Of course, I couldn’t know how he would have responded, because I never asked, and I am struggling with that.
There was care in what I was seeing, and responsibility, and a relationship that appeared to matter deeply to both of them. His circumstances were unknown to me. His attention to his dog was not.
I never spoke to him, and I don’t know his name or where they were headed. What stayed with me was a man making his way through the day with his companion following close behind, and a dog bed tucked beneath two pillows and a collection of belongings. To me, he was a stranger with a story I could only imagine. To that dog, I suspect, he was simply home.
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