(one of) the benefits of having a dog

Ryan left for work last night around 11:30pm, to work the graveyard shift. 

It's my weekend, so I stayed up to watch Jon Stewart and drool over Superheadz cameras on the computer... LOOK AT THIS 'BOOK' CAMERA. So. Great.

Images from here.

Anyway, so I was still awake when he left. Alone. And paranoid. The weather was terrible...kind of an island-style blizzard. Wet, heavy flakes that should be melting but it's juuuuust below zero so they stay and compact on the road, creating a vertitable ice rink. I could hear ambulance sirens, or maybe police sirens. Fire trucks? I still don't know the difference. The sky was glowing that weird sepia-amber that comes from snow clouds and city pollution reflecting street lights back at us.

There's something about being home alone at night, tired but still awake, that freaks the hell out of me. My imagination works triple time. Every noise is a robber, a monster, or worst of all...an alien! (Ha ha, it's so dumb but seriously, my brain goes there every time.)

Last night the sky was glowing yellow and there was a loud THUD on our roof when I was home alone. Have you ever seen that movie Signs? Yeah. There's thuds on their roof too. Alien footsteps thuds.

I also heard some in the backyard. What the hell? My heart raced as I turned off some of the lights and peered out the blinds. Who or what was in our yard?

THUD!

The last one woke Tank the bulldog up. He jumped to his feet still half asleep and let out the most ferocious bark I've ever heard. He's a lion when he's alarmed. And just like that I felt less afraid. I have a guard dog. To guard me!

He patrolled the house at my feet, alert with his ears up, listening to the weird noises outside, while I tried to unsuccessfully convince him (and myself) that nothing was going on out there.

All became quiet again. I put the dog to bed. I went to bed, and the cat was lying beside me. There was another thump, quiet this time, but I noticed that even the cat got nervous. We lay together in the dark, I was trying to go to sleep and the cat was trying to get me to pet her, both of us freezing all motion; holding our breath each time another THUMP was heard.

What is that? I kept thinking. And then the phone rang. It was Ryan's work number so I answered right away, grateful for the comfort of his voice. He told me he just arrived at his work twenty minutes late because of the weather. The ground was covered in snow and there were car accidents everywhere, but it was raining at the some time and giant clumps of wet snow were falling off the trees everywhere.

Ahhh, mystery solved.

I was placated and knew I shouldn't be afraid of wet snow, of course, but my imagination still wanted to carry me to those dark afraid corners of my brain...just knowing that even if it wasn't snow falling, but something more evil, I had Tank on guard was so comforting I quickly drifted off to sleep...