Asking for help to DU this - Democratic Underground

HillWilliam

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Mon Feb-15-10 07:55 PM
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Asking for help to DU this

Meet Callie, my "middle fur-daughter". Callie came to us about two years ago through WXII-12's Pet of the Week. I've told you a bit about her through the week, but let me tell you a little bit more about her today. There are a couple of links to click below and I'm asking for your clicks, but let me explain why.

Callie was presented as being three years old at the time, but when we got her home and looked at her, it was clear she was just a puppy, maybe five months old. Her teeth hadn't really come in yet and her build was slight. But she was already street-wise and far older "inside" than any youngun ever needed to be. She was dreadfully undernourished and you could tell that had been the case probably all of her life. Her coat was so thin you could see skin through it. Her skin was gray and her poor eyes were sunken in. She had no undercoat at all. She STANK, no just from being dirty, but from being toxic-unhealthy. The vet bills were awful. We really couldn't afford them, but we had room in our home and room in our hearts. Beanie-weenies aren't that bad. We'd lived on them before.

She wasn't socialized at all. It was easy to tell she had been tied out and left alone all of her life. You couldn't touch her collar at all. It took two months to get her confidence enough to be able to take the nasty thing off of her. She couldn't be blamed for her bad attitude. Apparently, whoever had her before had used her collar as a hand-hold to beat her. You couldn't undress around her -- if you took your belt off to put your pants in the laundry, she'd have a panic attack and hide. It took a lot of comforting to reassure her that in this house, humans do not attack canines or one another. This is a home where its inhabitants respect, love, comfort, and take up for one another.

Love is a powerful thing. A kind word, a kind act extended costs nothing, really, and it goes so very, very far. There are so many beings in this world, human and animal alike, who are so hungry and desperate for just such a single kindness.

I'm posting this today because, yes, I'm asking for something. A couple of clicks from you. Or at least one really important one.

Callie and I live in a rural county. It used to be one of the richest in the nation; now it ranks as one of the poorest. It has remote beauty, but for a lot of animals, that is its downfall and their peril. People come out here to abandon their unwanted pets in the false notion that domestic animals somehow know how to survive in the wild.

Here's a fact for you: they don't. Domesticated animals are just that. We humans have done that to them.

Put yourself in their place for just a moment. All your life you've had a warm bed, food, hands to pet you. Then you got old. Your mommy or daddy lost their job. Something Bad happened and you don't know what it was. You have no way of comprehending. Whatever "it" was, "it" wasn't your fault. But you're the one who got charmed into a "let's go ride!" and when you got to "go ride" you went to a wild, lonely place you'd never been before. The car door opens, you are set out, and the only family you'd ever know drives off and leaves you there.

It's cold. You're starving. You have no idea what to do or what you did to make them so mad at you. Your heart is breaking.

Now, your days are but few and it seems that nobody cares that you will probably die alone.

That's what happens in our county day after day. It has become a real problem. Our shelter is overwhelmed, understaffed, and has little to no budget to deal with it. Folks who live here are pretty bad-off, too. It's not like there's a line at Caswell APS's door with eager families waiting to adopt. The shelter has a no-kill policy, but nearly every week they have to shift charges to other shelters that can't guarantee a no-kill policy.

Callie and I would like to help. We've entered a contest where the grand prize goes directly to the charity of our choice. We choose to help the Animal Protection Society of Caswell County. If we can.

But we need your click here to do it and we would ask you to pass the link to your friends to vote for her, too. This is the most important link to click because it has the potential to do the most good.

Callie got lucky. I am so very blessed to have such a loving, giving, loyal creature come into my life. With a little help, more humans and four-leggers might get that same blessing, too.

The second click I'm asking for is just for fun. There is a prize, yes, but lordy, we've never won anything in our lives. But I think she's pretty and she's worked so hard to become a lady. She did the hard work herself so deserves a little press! Here's the second link. Thanks for your clicks.