My Favorite Stop

I've been delivering packages for almost nine years, and after a while, you stop seeing addresses as houses.

They're just numbers.

You learn which streets have nowhere to park, which apartment buildings require a code nobody ever remembers to put in the delivery instructions, and which houses have dogs that sound like they're going to come through the front door.

In the summer of 2022, I was working a route in Sacramento, California. One of my regular stops was a small beige house on a quiet street not far from Arden-Arcade.

The address was 417.

I don't remember the first package I delivered there, but I remember the dog.

He was an old golden retriever named Charlie.

The first few times I came, Charlie would be lying near the front door. As soon as he heard the truck, he'd slowly get up and walk toward me.

And I mean slowly.

His face had gone almost completely white, his back legs weren't great, and he had that stiff walk older dogs get where every step looks like it requires a little planning.

But his tail worked perfectly.

The owner was a woman named Linda, probably in her late sixties. One afternoon she opened the door while I was scratching Charlie behind the ears.

"He waits for you now," she said.

I laughed. "He waits for the packages?"

"No. You."

I thought she was joking.

After that, I started noticing him before I noticed the house.

Some days he'd be lying in the shade near the porch. Other days I'd see his head through the front window. If Linda had the door open, Charlie would hear my truck before I even stopped.

Eventually I started keeping dog treats in the truck.

Technically, they weren't just for Charlie. There were plenty of dogs on my route. But somehow the bag always seemed to end up in my pocket before I got to 417.

I started talking to him too.

"What's up, old man?"

"Still here?"

"You guarding the place today?"

Normal stupid things you say to a dog when nobody is around.

For almost two years, Charlie was part of my route.

I knew almost nothing about Linda. We probably never talked for more than two or three minutes at a time. But I knew Charlie had been her husband's dog originally. Her husband had died several years earlier, and Charlie had been with her ever since.

"He got me through it," she told me once.

That was all she said.

I understood what she meant.

Toward the end of 2023, Charlie started having more trouble getting to the door. Sometimes he'd just lift his head when I came.

So instead of making him walk to me, I'd bring the package over and sit beside him for a minute.

I'd give him his treat, scratch his neck and go back to work.

I had over a hundred stops some days. Everything about the job is built around moving quickly.

But I always gave Charlie his minute.

Then one Tuesday in February, I pulled up to 417 and he wasn't there.

I didn't think much of it.

The next delivery, he wasn't there either.

A week later, I had another package.

Still no Charlie.

Linda opened the door.

I already knew.

You know that feeling when somebody hasn't said anything yet, but you can tell from their face what they're about to tell you?

She looked at the treat in my hand.

"He went Saturday."

I didn't know what to say.

I asked if he had been sick.

She said he'd stopped eating a few days earlier. The vet told her it was probably time. She had someone come to the house so he wouldn't have to spend his last hours frightened in a clinic.

Then she said, "He had a good morning."

For some reason, that sentence got me.

Not right there. I handed her the package, told her I was sorry and went back to my truck.

I made it maybe three houses down before I had to pull over.

I sat there holding the steering wheel, crying over a dog that wasn't mine.

I felt stupid.

I'd delivered to that house for almost two years, but if you added up all the time I'd actually spent with Charlie, maybe it was a few hours total.

But that's the strange thing about animals. They don't need much time to become part of your routine.

Charlie didn't know my name.

He didn't know what I did when I wasn't wearing that uniform.

He didn't know if I was having a good day or a terrible one.

He just knew the sound of my truck.

And apparently that was enough.

A couple of weeks later, I had another delivery for Linda.

When she opened the door, she handed me a small plastic bag.

Inside was the half-empty bag of dog treats I'd left with her months earlier.

"I can't throw these away," she said. "Maybe you can give them to the other dogs."

I took them.

I still remember looking at that stupid bag of treats sitting in the passenger seat for the rest of my shift.

I couldn't open it.

Eventually I did. There was a German shepherd a few streets over who became the first recipient.

Life went on.

That's what routes do.

People move. Houses get sold. Kids grow up. Cars in driveways change. Dogs disappear.

A few months later, Linda moved too. The house at 417 was sold to a young couple.

They painted it white.

Now when I deliver there, there's sometimes a stroller on the porch.

No dog.

I don't know why I'm writing this except that I've been thinking about Charlie lately.

I think we underestimate how many small relationships make up a life. Not best friends. Not family. Just familiar faces. The cashier who knows your order. The neighbor who waves every morning. The old man you see walking the same street. The dog who recognizes the sound of your truck.

You don't realize they've become part of your world until one day they're not there.

If you are out and there's an old dog sleeping somewhere near you, give him an extra minute today.

Put your phone down.

Scratch behind his ears.

Let him take too long on the walk.

Because eventually you'll have plenty of time to get where you're going.

He won't.