Everyday I walk by a bag of sand and I mistake it for a sad dog.

There is a lot of construction happening in my neighborhood. Road work here is miraculously slow: a full year has passed and this one narrow street is still half-finished. They are trying to build two bikelanes in a one-way street, which is probably part of the initiative to make the Great Boston area more bike-friendly. But that does not explain why, every morning at around 7AM, I am jolted awake by the shrill beeping of asphalt pavers backing into another one-way street, blocking traffic on both ends.

Lately, I have started walking everywhere. I think I first began to enjoy walking moderate distances for fun when I was in Vietnam–maybe in elementary school, when the sky market was a fifteen-minute walk away, or in high school, when I got tired of waiting for the bus to take me just three stops home. Walking in the U.S. is usually a better experience: the air is cleaner, and the soundscape does not always vibrate at full throttle. I walked to work in Santa Cruz, and now I have a similar distance here.

For the past few weeks, everyday when I leave my house, turn to my right, and begin my walk to work, I get startled by the sight of a sad dog. Or at least, that is what I thought. In my mind, the dog is lying in a lion’s pose with its tongue out, waiting by a white sign that warns passers-by of construction just in case the torn-up asphalt and heavy machinery weren’t enough of a hint. Its fur is white, ears flecked with black. I have little intuition about canine breeds, but I would say its a male labrador retriever, weighing at fifty pounds. It does not look tired, which is why I think its alive.

It does not take more than two seconds to realize that that is not a dog. It is but a bag of sand, or possibly cement, slumped in a posture conveniently canine. I mean, for the illusion to work, the dog has to be perfectly still-frozen, almost petrified–it could have been one of those mythic wartime dogs, waiting so long for its owner to return that it died and became stone. Boston weather was pretty brutal this past year.

I think this is a problem unique to me. I doubt anyone else walks by that sandbag every day and wonders, however briefly, if a dog has chosen that exact spot near a construction zone to lie down. Maybe other people see something else. Like a Rorschach test, or some diagnostic tool for potential schizophrenics. Maybe we all hallucinate a little, if only for a second, in ways specific to the peculiarities we have lived through.

Still, I wonder: what if there had been a dog there?

Maybe it belonged to one of the workers. The dog is loyal yet nervous, unwilling to be left at home, possibly because of some negligent previous owner. It waits near the site, tongue out, ears perked, watching its person move through dust and noise. That would speak to the tenacity and loyalty of animals–qualities not exactly unknown to us, but all the more striking in the middle of a chaotic, dust-choked road intersection, mid-excavation, surrounded by hard-hatted workers irritable from the humidity and grit.

Or what if it was in fact a stray dog looking in vain for its past owner? Maybe it is not sitting on the sidewalk, but in front of the house at the corner, where it was adopted as a furry companion to an elderly woman after her spouse had passed away. They shared a quiet decade together. When she died, the house was sold to the state; there were no close relatives. But the dog never moved on. It only knew one home. And so it stayed, guarding what remained.

Let me be clear: there is no dog. There is only a motionless bag of sand, probably dropped there a month ago, that still manages to startle me ever so gently, briefly, and unintentionally. Without me, it would still continue to be a burlap bag that stays at that exact spot, perhaps until the construction is finished or the sand within it becomes of use. It has no stake in my perception. Without me, it continues being what it is. It does not need my attention. And I certainly do not need its.

The stories that I conjure up and project onto it are entirely fictional. I have never raised a dog. I have no personal wellspring of memory about loyal pets or canine companionship. Nor do I feel like I have an urge for that to be true, although I think no one rejects the unconditional love that emanates from the pets you help raise. I do not even have to perceive of the sandbag, let alone fantasize about what its mistaken identity might have lived through.

Still, I look.

And when I do, the pattern is always the same: surprise, then recognition, then a strange, flickering mix of reflection, invention, and emotion. I let myself believe, just for a moment, that the dog is real–that there is some quiet lore unfolding between us, that we cross paths for a reason, even if it is one no one else can see. Or, better than with me, I hope the dog has led a life sentimentally charged with its human counterpart, their relationship charged with tenderness, camaraderie, and excitement. I imagine their days filled with joy, the kind of love you only find in fables, where every event unfolds toward a moral, and goodness is always rewarded in the end.

In real life, not every story ends with tidy resolutions. The story of life is composed of ephemeral moments that do not demand anything more than a brief observation. Occasionally, these impressions recur, but mostly they are fleeting interactions, meant to pass through us without leaving a permanent mark. Life is not always asking for big, grand revelations. Sometimes, it is enough just to notice something and let it linger with you, even if only for a second. The sandbag, the dog, the aerosolized particulates from construction–their existence does not change, but it makes me pause to think if only for a moment. Maybe that is enough. Maybe it is enough to let ourselves be affected by the things we see, however small or strange, and to carry that feeling with us, if just for the briefest of seconds.

There is nothing special about me. And there is nothing special about the sandbag. Our relationship does not really go anywhere. There is no real story here. Nothing has to mean anything for me to want it to exist.

One day the bag will be gone. And when it is, I will be glad the chapter has ended, even if it never really began.