A Dog Found Roaming a Highway Leads Police to the Site of Her Owner's Truck Crash and Saves Two Lives

If there's one major way in which I've seen our culture change since I was a kid, it's that the fiction I grew up on consisted of a lot less procedural crime dramas filled with beheadings and dismemberments, and a lot more stories about animals saving people. Old Yeller fighting off a bear to save his best human friend. Mowgli being protected from Shere Kahn by Baloo. Lassie ran to the sheriff so many times to warn him Timmy was in danger, I think he actually learned to bark "The kid fell down another fucking well" in English. My favorite book was "My Side of the Mountain," about a kid living in the wilderness with no one but the falcon he rescued and trained to hunt. Superman didn't need help from anyone, but Krypto the Superdog saved his invulnerable ass more times than the rest of the Justice League combined. There was a show about a family with a pet dolphin named Flipper and another about a family with a pet bear named Gentle Ben. And I can't remember an episode, but I think they were always saving somebody from an attack by a shark, an electric eel, a mountain lion, or a Communist, respectively. 

The point being, in a simpler time (with a lot fewer options for our attention), our major form of entertainment was Heroic Animal Fiction. But somewhere along the way, we've traded in these iconic American heroes for Emotional Support animals on planes and tiny, rat-sized dogs you carry to the office in your purse. It's the direction our culture has been heading for decades and the trend doesn't seem to be going away any time soon. 

Thank God though (thank Dog?), that the non-fiction version of these beloved creatures is still very much a part of real life. Meet Tinsley the Shiloh shepherd, and behold her incredible but true story. 

WCVB - The New Hampshire State Police department said Tuesday that one of its troopers responded at about 10 p.m. Monday to a report of a loose dog ... on I-89 north and when they approached the dog, it continued to run north on the highway and crossed into Hartford, Vermont.

A short time later, police noticed a damaged section of the guardrail near the Interstate 91 and Interstate 89 junction and then found a badly-damaged pickup truck that had rolled over.

"They could tell the dog was trying to show them something because she kept trying to get away from them but didn't run away totally," said New Hampshire State Police Lt. Daniel Baldassarre. "It was kind of, 'Follow me. Follow me.' And they did that and, to their surprise, to see the guardrail damaged and to look down to where the dog is looking at, they were almost in disbelief."

Police then found two people who had been ejected from the truck and were seriously injured and hypothermic as a result of the crash. The trooper and the officers then quickly called for medical assistance. ...

Tinsley's owner, Cam Laundry ... said he will spoil Tinsley with a venison burger for dinner Tuesday night, followed by some back scratches.

First of all, a reward of venison burger is the most New Hampshire/Vermont border thing I've ever heard. Secondly, Cam Laundry better give her all the back scratches in the world. But really if I know dogs anything about dogs, for Tinsley saving two human lives is its own reward. I don't fully understand what evolutionary process took place between early, nomadic hunter-gather peoples and wild canines in order to form this bond, but it is very, very real. Biological at this point. Instinctual. It's in the DNA of both species to look after one another. 

To the point that an animal that (quoting "Pulp Fiction" now), doesn't have the common sense to disregard its own feces, understands that in a moment of grave danger, that going out on the road and alerting the other humans will make summon the humans who have the vehicles with the flashing lights on top and they'll do what needs to be done. A hero finding other heroes. And two people are alive today because of it. I'd suggest this would make a great short story or episode of a TV show, but I'm afraid that ship has sailed. Instead, let's just enjoy this for what it is: A very, very positive news item. And we don't get as many of those as we used to, either. Who's a good girl, Tinsley? You are.