The first time I smashed a car window to save a dog, I was nineteen years old and still in training.

The deputy I was riding with didn’t argue.

He just handed me the punch tool and said, “Do it.”

The sound of tempered glass exploding stayed with me for weeks.

So did the feeling of that dog licking my wrist afterward while oxygen flowed through a tiny mask over his nose.

Twenty years later, I’ve responded to more hot-car calls than I can count.

Some end well.