The Freedom of Working from Home

Sometimes it’s not the job that helps you impact the world, but sometimes it helps.

Five months ago, I was working a job that was financially fulfilling, but emotionally draining. The ratio was no longer tolerable for me. I won’t go deep into it, but in the middle of a pandemic and at a time when my faith in my employer’s morality was at an all-time low, they announced our pay cuts. The lower pay rate was scheduled to begin on my first day back from a week’s vacation. I never came back from that vacation.

Now, I work from home doing mostly gig-work on the internet (including publishing on Vocal, of course) and some odd-jobs here and there, like house calls for dog nail trims or working with catering and special events in my city through friends and family. I’m not bringing in what I was, but I can still budget and I’m not hurting.

Working from home has awarded me many things. More time with my pets, the ability to set my own pace on projects, and working on my own projects much more regularly; are all great, but the simplest truth is it’s the freedom that makes it great.

Freedom from a boss over my shoulder actually let me help out a lost soul on my street. It’s the type of freedom where when you are waiting on repairperson to come to the house you don’t have to schedule it six weeks out because of work.

On a weekday, I had to call someone to take a look at some cracks in our basement. He said he could be there in forty minutes. Had I still been working a day job I could’ve never made the meeting on the same day like that.

I step outside to go check the mail. One yard over is a black and tan Australian shepherd I’ve never seen before. My best guess is it’s about one or two years old and around thirty-five to forty-five pounds. I’ve studied dogs a lot and have a knack for weights. It’s even easier when it’s one of my favorite breeds. Even if I’ve never had one, myself.

First, I glance around in search of an owner, but alas. Once I’m noticed, the barking starts. It isn’t an aggressive bark, just confusion. I walk into the street and away from the dog so it will feel more comfortable. It works and pooch runs straight over to me. “Hiya, buddy.”

Pup jumps up for the hug and kiss. Cool. This is a friendly dog and seems healthy too, but no tags and there is no one outside on my cul-de-sac. My girlfriend, who was home from work that day, saw me in the street hugging an unfamiliar dog. As she steps out the door I hear her say "The dog whisperer is in the street with a stray dog. I've got to go."

Luckily, she was home because we’ve a pack of our own inside. None of which need a new sibling, nor an unplanned visitor.

My girlfriend went back inside to borrow a collar and leash from our eighty-five-pound boxer. It was a little loose, despite the Aussie having much thicker fur. Even though the dog was friendly I didn’t want to push our luck by taking it off to resize it or try resizing it on the dog.

Next, we walked up and down our street. We’re on a little cul-de-sac off a main road. So, there weren’t a lot of places this dog could’ve come from. By now, we’re calling the dog names like friend and bud as it darts up the road and back to us. The collar is staying on, but we know it could slip off if pup moves the right way.

We walk in hopes that someone looking for their dog might turn up and see us. Since neither of us have ever seen this dog on the street before, we think we may need to check the adjacent neighborhood. There’s a park behind our house and behind that is a neighborhood. We have to cut through the park and somebody’s backyard to get to the next street or risk walking someone else’s dog on a main road in a loose collar.

No way. I’ll go for the trespassing, but we have to split up. We kind of left on the fly, so her phone was back at the house and we had someone coming for a quote in a few minutes. She went back home to deal with that and to start looking up lost pet reports.

That left me wandering the neighborhood with a stranger’s dog on my leash. I eagerly anticipated every random car that went by. Every time, I believed this driver was going to leap out of their car and shout “There you are.” They and the dog would then frolic over to one another in slow-motion and hug. They would thank me for my help and drive off.

Nope, each car that slowed down was just driving safely around the guy with the dog. Nice of them, but it did lead to me getting extra disappointed a few times. After walking for some time, I had to turn back. I started to think about the dog needing water and it was making me thirsty too as the sun was really starting to beat down.

I couldn’t go back the way I came because I wanted to cover as much ground as possible. So, to do this while still avoiding the main road I had to cut through a few more yards. Including the huge yard on the corner of our street and the main road.

This yard is huge and gorgeous. They maintain it very well and here I am, with someone else’s dog and no poop bags. The anxiety that I may become guilty of leaving dog poop on someone else’s lawn mortified me. As I wanted to walk faster to avoid this risk, I feel the leash go tight behind me. Oh no.

I turn around and this Aussie has just plopped down in the grass. If you’re not familiar with the breed, the Australian shepherd is a working breed. This means they are very high energy with a play/work drive that lasts from sun up until sundown, unless it’s not used up by then. Then, they’ll just keep going.

Looking back at this high energy dog stretched out on the grass and panting, I ask “How long had you been going before you met me?”

Then I realize what might be worse. I cannot carry this dog all the way back home. So, we take a rest for a few moments, right in the middle of fancy neighbor’s fancy lawn. I ask the dog “Do you live here?” Knowing full well that it must not. The people who do are always out in their yard, except right now conveniently. You’d think I’d have noticed this dog once before.

After a few moments, pooch is ready to move again. As we get back onto our cul-de-sac, excitement suddenly ramps up. I’m excited to be almost home, but not nearly as excited as this dog just got. Keep in mind that we already walked up and down the whole street before we cut to the other neighborhood with no seemingly unusual excitement.

I’m in my mind thinking about how I’m going to have to separate this dog from my dogs when we get back. You never know what could happen bringing a new dog into the house. I lose focus on the dog for just a second in this thought when suddenly the leash goes limp.

I look back and see the dog running away having slipped the collar. It runs up a nearby driveway and into an open garage. I wait in the street a moment to see if the dog’s owner might let it in or whatnot. Then flying from the garage comes my new friend who greets me with the same hug and kiss from earlier in the street.

This time, I don’t put the collar on. I simply walk to the front door of this home with the dog following close behind. It’s kind of an awkward porch where you walk up steps and then have to walk a few feet down the house toward the front door. There’s a railing right behind me as I go to knock on the door. For some reason, this makes me feel really trapped. I haven’t knocked on a stranger’s door since I sold Kirby vacuums, please forgive me, but sufficed to say, I expected a gruff, uncomfortable person to answer the door and demand me gone.

Instead, I got a bewildered looking adolescent boy with bright blonde hair.

“Is this your dog?” I ask.

The boy looks down, still befuddled. “Steve?!?”

He opens the door and Steve runs right in. Straight to his water dish if I had to guess.

“He was at my house, but he led me here. So, he does know his way home.” I say before turning away.

I didn’t bother to clue him in on the fact that Steve just went for a lengthy walk far from home before leading me back to his house only five houses down from mine.

I made my way back home and shared my story with my girlfriend and a gentleman whom I’d never met before, but was here to hopefully schedule some work on our house.

Who knows what would have happened had I not checked the mail when I did? We all know the risks an unattended pet is taking, but in Steve’s story nothing went wrong.

In a way, this is really a story about how I didn’t impact the world, but Steve got to go for a nice, long, adventure through a neighborhood he’s probably never seen before. I hope Steve looks back on that day as fondly as I do.