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The 317 Project tells stories of life in all of Indianapolis’ vibrant neighborhoods – 317 words at a time.
It was an hour past midnight on a cold evening in late October. Whistling, and yelling gently, Eric Worthington drove through his neighborhood on South Arlington Avenue.
He was looking for his pet Chihuahua, Tippy, like he does most nights since he’s gone missing in July.
Worthington recalls Tippy with tears in his eyes. Tippy’s absence reminds him of the loss of his 17-year-old daughter, who died in a car accident in 2009, something he still deals with “every day.”
Her twin sister remained living with Worthington until she moved out with her son in March 2020, leaving Worthington to face the “emptiness.”
“It was just me and my dogs after that,” Worthington said. “Thank God for them.”
There are three: Tippy, Dot and Moe-Moe.
They were always there, he said, and always happy, including when he returned from the hospital, where he wound up just three months after his daughter left, and where he remained for the next three months after two brain surgeries and heart surgery.
His first day home, Tippy was eager to greet him.
“He was jumping all over me, so excited, wagging his tail,” Worthington said. “It was a feeling of comfort … like a ‘I missed you.’”
On July 31, 2021, Worthington woke up about 6 a.m. greeted by “grief and panic” – he didn’t see Tippy during the dogs’ routine bathroom trip to the backyard.
He ran, yelled and drove around the neighborhood until midnight looking for Tippy.
Since then, he’s looked in ditches, printed and hung flyers, painted signs, joined Facebook groups, even created one.
Halloween marked three months since Tippy disappeared. But Worthington knows he’s out there and keeps looking for him.
“A friend of mine said she doesn’t want me to get consumed by it,” he said. “But it’d be like your daughter or child went missing, you’re going to do whatever you can, whatever it takes.”
Contact IndyStar reporter Brandon Drenon at 317-517-3340 or BDrenon@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter: @BrandonDrenon.
Brandon is also a Report for America corps member with the GroundTruth Project, an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization dedicated to supporting the next generation of journalists in the U.S. and around the world.
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