93-yr-old lost his dog for nearly 2 weeks after a grocery trip—his unwashed socks sparked an unbelievable reunion
A pet might be connected to their human in more ways than one. However, people were still quite surprised when a 93-year-old owner was reunited with his beloved dog because of his socks. The man, Norm Feigenbaum, had gone out to the grocery store when his seven-year-old dog, Sunny, decided to scale the fence and follow him. So when Norm came back home, Sunny was gone. The dog was lost for two weeks and the man had started losing hope, until one trick prompted a reunion, per ABC News.
After a few days of Sunny's disappearance, Norm was sure that Sunny, his best friend, was gone. "The house was barren without her." Norm recounted how Sunny had managed to escape the house to try and follow him to the grocery store. "She jumped the block wall fence in the back and tried to follow me to the grocery store." He looked for leads for a few days, but came up short. So he reached out to Dog Days Search and Rescue, an animal search and rescue team. The organization put up flyers all around the area to help reunite Sunny and Norm. There was a photo of Sunny and an address. "93-year-old owner missing his best friend. Do not chase," the poster read.
Around a week later, the team got information from a woman who had spotted Sunny at a nature reserve around a mile away from her house. "There was no water. There were coyotes. We knew she was on borrowed time at that point," a volunteer explained. The team immediately started setting up traps all around the reserve to find Sunny and get her back to safety. They also employed a clever trick and left a trail of Norm's unwashed socks that led to a trap. "The whole thing was probably because of my smelly socks, actually," Norm remarked. Sunny seemed to recognize the smell and followed it until she came into one of the traps. The team managed to find her just 30 minutes after laying the traps.
The dog was immediately taken to the vet after that and treated for a few minor cuts and bruises. Then the moment both Norm and Sunny had been eagerly waiting for arrived. The two of them were glad to see each other again and Sunny looked happy to be safe, sound and back home. About his socks, Norm joked, "I am not going to wash them. I am going to frame them and put them up on the wall." The rescue team was working to secure the fence area from where Sunny escaped, according to a comment on their Instagram post, where they go by @dogdayssar.
"We temporarily fixed the spot where Sunny jumped the fence before we went home, but it will need a more permanent solution. We would love to see if we could get some volunteers to come out and do some major clean-up of Norm's overgrown yard and make some necessary modifications to prevent this from happening at any point in the future," the comment read. People in the comments section of the YouTube video were happy at Norm and Sunny's reunion. @KellyColeman wrote, "What a happy ending! Man found his best friend! God bless them both! That made me smile!" @Carolinarocker398 commented, "What a story, but thankfully a happy one. Dogs have an amazing sense of smell…good or bad."