Bingo Night's Surprise Winners

A true story of triumph against all odds.

Photo by Audri Van Gores

My new apartment is in senior housing. Two bedrooms, two bathrooms, 910 square feet, $1,045 a month, including electricity. I am overjoyed to have a spacious, lovely apartment with eastern-facing, wall-to-wall windows, five closets, two of which are walk-ins. Room for all the exercise equipment I’ve accumulated that I never use. I am grateful.

I’m also embarrassed. Several friends reacted with alarm when I told them my plans to move into a senior apartment complex. Virtually everyone scrunches up their nose, as if they’re imagining state-run nursing home smells.

“Senior housing? That means you’ll be living with old people.”

“Affordable rent.” I leave it there. This is the first sensible financial decision I’ve ever made in my life.

The day after the movers hauled in my furniture, I’m still transporting boxes from my old apartment, one carload at a time. It’s 8 p.m. on Thursday, May 30, 2024, and I need to return the keys to my old apartment by noon on Friday. I’m nowhere near done clearing out my crap. I’m on the brink of exhausted despair. Also, I’m hungry.

A stranger enters the picture

I pull up to my new senior living community and spot an unneutered male pit bull roaming around the front of the property, weaving in and out of the patch of tiger lilies. The poor dog is emaciated; his ribs are visible in the dim dusk light. He has scars all over his body.

I remain in my car and call Scranton Animal Control. I explain the situation to the guy who answers the phone. He responds with, “What town are you in?”

I’m like, “This is Scranton Animal Control, right?”

“Right.”

“Oddly enough, I’m in Scranton.”

“Okay. I’ll send someone right over.”

So, I stay in the car to see if someone shows up. Precious minutes tick by. Help does not arrive. The dog wanders away, and I get back to my task at hand. I pull the car in front of the sliding glass doors (senior living communities always have sliding doors), go inside, get a shopping cart that senior housing provides residents (one of our many amenities), pull boxes out of my car, and pile them in the cart.

I open the vestibule door, and the doors stay open a really long time because seniors and their walkers move very slowly. Just as I open the second door from the vestibule to the lobby, the pit bull races right past me, down a 20-foot hallway, and into the community room where approximately 50 people who are at least 90 years old are playing Bingo.

I leave the cart and sprint after the dog, who is now tearing around the community room.

The Bingo guy doesn’t miss a beat. “B19,” he shouts into a microphone. A woman to my right screams, “Bingo!”

From a group of women whose hair is all styled the same, I hear one say, “She always wins.”

The dog turns toward the voice and trots over to her, as if agreeing with her tacit conspiracy theory.

“Is he your dog?” a man asks. And others around the room repeat the question.

I don’t have time to be insulted. I don’t bother to explain, I am not the sort of person who would have an unneutered male pit bull who is emaciated and abused.

“He’s a stray,” I say.

A stray I can’t believe I’m trying to help. I am afraid of pit bulls. JuJu, my elderly shih-tzu mix, was mauled by one in 2021. It took four surgeries to put JuJu’s right hindquarters back together. Although I wish this were not true, I am a person who knows how to hold a grudge.

But I have to admit, the dog seems friendly enough. He’s going up to people. They’re feeding him potato chips and Fritos. And clearly, the dog loves Bingo because the Bingo guy keeps calling out numbers— “G11!” — and the dog is now rolling around on the floor. He has no intention of leaving the Bingo game.

Animal Control has still not arrived, so I call 911.

“Hi. I’m at Webster Towers, where an unneutered male pit bull is roaming around a community room filled with 90-year-olds playing Bingo and trying to pet him. The potential for disaster is unlimited. Could you please send help?”

“Call Animal Control.” The dispatcher hangs up.

I don’t know what sort of psychic shift occurred while I was on the phone with 911, but something in the dog changed. He is looking much less friendly. He’s baring his teeth at a group of Jazzy-ridden elders sitting at a table in the corner. He’s circling them, and as one reaches out to him, I screech, “DON’T TOUCH HIM.”

The women give me stinkeye and mutter amongst themselves. One says, “Her dog is certainly friendlier than she is.”

Someone’s caregiver realizes the situation and approaches me. I ask her to call 911 and explain we need help now. In the meantime, I run up to my apartment to get food to try to lure the intact male pit bull out of the community room filled with 90-year-olds with a gambling problem.

I put together a bowl of homemade stuff I cook up for JuJu. I also fill up another bowl with crunchies because I have no way of knowing which the pit bull will prefer. I race back down to the community room.

Picky eater? Bingo fanatic? Just a plain ole menace?

I approach the pit bull with offerings of food, but he growls at me. He’s also growling at the 90-year-old, stomping his foot, trying to shoo away the dog. I’m fighting to keep my voice calm while repeating, “Please don’t antagonize the dog.”

Someone else asks if he’s mine, and now I shout, “Yes! He’s my dog. LEAVE MY DOG ALONE.”

I show the growling pit bull the bowls of food, but he’s dubious. The dog is literally starving, but he’s reluctant to follow me out of the community room. I’m like, wow, you know you’re a terrible cook when a famished, emaciated stray dog would rather stay hungry than eat something you’ve made. And, by the way, where the hell is Animal Control? Where are the cops?

Finally, and this took what felt like hours, I get the dog out into the hallway. The caregiver who stepped up to help closes the door and tells everyone in the room to keep the door shut. The dog is trapped in the hallway, and he’s eating the homemade food, but not the kibble. Catastrophe is averted. All we need is Animal Control to take him to safety.

But, just then, two women who are about three feet tall each and at least 150 years old open the community room door and come toddling out. The dog races past them, back into the room. He resumes growling from table to table.

This draws a mixed reaction. Some are delighted to see him. The angry old man who was stomping his feet at the dog picks up a cane and hobbles toward the dog.

I step between them, more afraid of what I might do to the mean old man than what the dog might do.

Fate intervenes. Finally. Sirens. I rush outside to greet a cop sitting in a squad SUV.

“Why’d you call me?” he says. “You need Animal Control.”

“They never came.”

“Well, I’m not getting out of the car,” the cop says.

“What do you mean you’re not getting out of the car?” My voice has reached a pitch that hurts my own ears.

“I’m not getting mauled by a pit bull.” He folds his arms across his chest.

“90-year-olds are going to die if you don’t do something!”

He shakes his head. “I’m waiting until Animal Control gets here.”

I go back to the community room, and now the Bingo players are finally alarmed. They’ve realized the growling, unneutered male pit bull may not be friendly. There’s a lot of buzzing, a lot of squeaking walkers, and wobbling canes. Wheelchairs. I’m starting to panic. But then I hear someone yell, “Animal Control is outside!”

I run, relieved, ready to explain everything, but the humane officer cuts me off. “We’re in the middle of an emergency. What are we supposed to do with that dog?”

“Well, for one thing, you can remove him from the senior center and take him to a dog shelter.”

“No,” the officer replies. She and her partner are still in their van. “The shelters will not take a dangerous pit bull.”

I’m truly dumbfounded. I’m out of ideas. I mean, I’m really good with animals. But I’m terrified of pit bulls, and I still resent the entire breed for one of their brethren harming JuJu.

If you want a job done right . . .

That’s when I realize it really is up to me to find the solution. I (unwittingly) let the dog in the building. I’m the one who has to get him out and to safety.

So, I go back to the community room with the bowl of food, and son-of-a-gun if the dog doesn’t follow me right out. I trap him in the hallway again and enlist a seemingly sane, relatively unancient person to guard the door and prevent anyone from opening it. I go outside and tell Animal Control the dog is trapped. All they have to do is take him to a shelter.

“No one will take him,” they insist.

“What if I find a shelter that will?”

“Be our guest.”

You, my dear friends, know that I work for a farm animal sanctuary, Indraloka, that has a vet clinic that gives low-cost (read: nearly free) vet care to the rescued animals of local shelters. So I call the sanctuary founder, Indra, hoping she’ll pull some strings. I mean, those shelters literally owe us. The call goes directly to voicemail.

I call Dr. Leslie, the vet who runs our clinic. Voicemail. It’s now 9 p.m., and everyone at the sanctuary gets to work at 5:30 a.m. They are not answering their phones after working a 15-hour day. But I’m not out of options. I call Alexa, the vet tech/nurse practitioner who works at the sanctuary clinic and is in her 20s, which means she might answer her phone. And when she does, I’m crying because the Animal Control officers are adamant that they cannot help the dog.

I tell Alexa what’s going on and then screech out the door to the humane officers. “You just need to get the dog to Indraloka. We’ll take care of him.”

“Have Indraloka come and get him.”

“I can’t,” I explain. “Everyone’s in bed.”

The two Animal Control officers whisper to each other. The cop who still hasn’t emerged from his squad car is staring straight ahead, pretending to be oblivious to the chaos. The humane officers’ voices are getting louder as they argue about what to do and scream at the cop to help. Everyone — except me — is on the same page. No one will approach the dog.

I call Alexa again. She makes a few calls. Just get the dog out of the senior living facility, and Blue Chip Rescue will pick him up.

I can’t even describe my relief. But the ordeal is not quite over. We still have to get the dog from the hallway, where he is trapped, and into the Animal Control van.

Using the food, I lure the dog into the vestibule and trap myself in there with him. He’s growling at me and making circles around me.

Animal Control is telling me to stay still.

I am an exceedingly high-strung person under the best of circumstances. I don’t know how I didn’t die from panic and/or terror.

Or maybe I do. Obviously, if the dog wanted to do harm, he had ample opportunity over the past hour. He could have gone on a mass murder rampage in that community room. It would have been like shooting fish in a barrel. Fifty 90-year-olds in wheelchairs and walkers. He could have mauled every single one of them to death.

But he didn’t even try to bite anyone.

So, I’m not truly terrified being trapped in the vestibule with the dog. But I am also not exactly comfortable.

Anyway, the dog jumps onto the vestibule bench, and I take the opportunity to escape into the hallway.

Another challenge before the miracle

Animal Control has no crates because earlier that evening, they’d just rescued over 30 cats and dogs from an animal hoarder and used every available cage. The dog will have to ride in the back of the police squad SUV to the precinct, where Blue Chip, the rescue, will pick him up.

But I know the cop is afraid of the dog. I get it in my head that the cop will shoot the dog.

So, I call Alexa again, sobbing. “The cop is going to kill the dog.”

Alexa talks me off the ledge yet again.

The next day, Blue Chip brings the dog to Indraloka to be neutered. Dr. Leslie and Alexa are unable to treat him because, even muzzled, he is trying desperately to bite them.

The miracle

In my spiritual practice, we define miracles as a shift in perspective. A miracle is a realization of a reality I could not see.

That dog could have maimed numerous people. Animal Control could have declared him dangerous and shot him. The cop could have refused to transport the dog. Alexa could have let my calls go to voicemail.

But none of that happened. And none of those events is THE miracle.

THE miracle is the way God chose to heal me from the trauma of watching JuJu be mauled by a pit bull three years earlier.

I was not letting go of that resentment. I hated the woman who owned the pit bull. I hated my landlord for renting an apartment to a pit bull. I hated the City of Scranton for not outlawing pit bulls. And I hated pit bulls. Imagine — I am an animal rights activist who spends hours daily helping animals of all species achieve compassionate care — and there I was hating one specific type of dog.

It was a contradiction that hurt my heart and soured my soul.

But my higher power found the perfect way for me to be healed. Give me a job to rescue an animal, and my God-given instincts kick in. I’m here on this planet solely — and souly — to help animals. That is God’s purpose for me.

Happy ending

Blue Chip Rescue took my pittie friend back to its shelter and worked on socializing him. Weeks later, he was neutered and adopted out immediately afterward.

This dog, whom I later found out was a victim of a dog fighting ring, this abused, scared, scarred, starved, sentient being, was spared a heinous life and a despicable death. And now he is someone’s beloved animal companion.

He has a family. He gets to go on walks, sleep in his dog momma’s bed, and eat as much as he wants.

I rescued my pittie friend from abuse by humans, and he rescued me from the self-abuse of resentment.

Miracles are everywhere. And every being is a bodhisattva. I can have a miracle any time I choose, as long as I’m willing to surrender my prejudices, and fears, and feelings of ill-will. Miracles are always occurring, if only I’m willing to realize them.

Every Monday and Thursday, Bingo nights, I think of my pittie friend and send out a prayer of gratitude to him. I smile up at God, and imagine God smiling down on me.

God has a great sense of humor.

Photo by Joshua Hoehne