Natasa Popovic from Yugoslavia I didn't know how beautiful it is to share time with somebody until I was alone all day for a period of time. When I came here, my husband already had a job. He worked very hard in this job. He left the house at about 9 a.m. and he came back at about 8 p.m. I was alone all day long. For some time, I worked in our backyard. I weeded the grass out of the garden, seeded the flowers, repaired the sprinkler, and cut old branches off of the trees. Our garden became beautiful. I enjoyed being there for the morning coffee, sometimes with my friends, sometimes alone One day, when I was reading a book, I heard somebody move in the corner of my garden. At first, I was scared, then I thought it was a cat. I was surprised when I heard the barking of a dog. It was a nice, young dog, black and white colored. With one look, I thought we made a connection. It started barking happily. It seemed it wasn't afraid. I came into the house, took some food for the dog and went into the garden. The dog was always in the same place. I put the plate with food close to it and sat on the terrace to drink my beverage. The dog left the corner and took the food. After that, it came back to the corner. Then the dog started to run toward me when I went out. It made me happy. "Somebody is happy when it hears my footsteps," I thought. At that time, I didn't feel alone anymore, but one question was always in my mind. "Who is the owner of this dog? Is there anybody who cares for it?" My husband and I decided to put notices on trees nearby. I wrote that I found a dog. I described it. I hoped that nobody would come. It was raining when a woman and a little boy came. I opened the door. The woman explained they lost a dog, and maybe it was the dog in my garden. I looked at them disappointedly. They came into the garden and the dog recognized them. The boy was very happy. The woman said something like they were very thankful because her son was very sad. I was confused. On the one hand, I felt I lost a friend for my garden, but on the other hand, I felt that the dog didn't belong to me. Small sadness was put in my heart. "Alone again." But two weeks later I enrolled in school. I studied hard six days a week. I hadn't time for the garden anymore. Sometimes in the evening when I came back from school, I went out to the garden. I wanted to hear and to see my dog. But the garden was empty; I was alone again.
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