How do people do it?
Today has been a funny day for me, a day of ups and downs when it comes to thinking about animal rescue and how the lives of Susie-Belle and Twinkle have changed beyond recognition but also how my life has changed through them.
It was a cold, wet walk first thing and I was plodding round the field feeling the dreariness of November creep in when I met a lady I haven’t seen for a few months but have wanted to see since we brought Twinkle to our home. She has 3 cocker spaniels and she is only other person I know locally with 3 dogs of the same breed, so I feel a loose affinity with her. This has been strengthened by her going through the sad process of one of her dogs going blind and having an eye removed – our old lady Jasmine lost an eye in her last few weeks – and by us discussing the nasty topic of bad breeders and puppy farmers. As we chatted in the rain this morning we brought each other up to date with our news, she was very taken with Twinkle and we bemoaned the dismal state of the law when it comes to allowing puppy farmers and dealers to continue their wicked business – her blind dog came from a local pet shop and my mother’s neighbour also has a spaniel from the same place, also now going blind. All down to bad breeding practices. So depressing. But then we had a lovely chat about how she is thinking about fostering dogs and we ended on a happy note, both knowing that we are doing our best for our dogs and tell anyone we can about avoiding bad commercial breeders.
Then I came home and heard from a good friend that a pair of dogs, schnauzers that had taken months and months to find their new home when their elderly owner had died and they found themselves in rescue, have been returned and are now once again homeless. The story makes me weep with sadness and anger in equal measure. The tale is the new owner, the one who promised a forever home to these two darling dogs, had a baby and now that the days are short and the weather’s cold, can’t walk the dogs and cope with the baby at the same time. So, the dogs get dumped. And my friend picks up the pieces.
How people can work in animal rescue and stay cheerful – my friend is wonderful, kind, patient – escapes me. I know that I couldn’t do the face-to-face work, I couldn’t deal with the people that let down the dogs, time and time again. I would be too angry to cope. I would hate the emotions I would regularly feel. So all I can do is offer my home to my two special dogs who have known hardship, hatred, cruelty and neglect, but who now, every single day show nothing but love, peace and kindness to the humans they live with. How inspiring dogs can be, and how depressing humans too often are.
