Sweetie and the 'other' side of rescue

Those of us who love animals and advocate for all of the unwanted and discarded ones sometimes get to see the companion animal who's found reprieve from death and is awarded a happy ending with love and care from a family to call their own. That is what makes the heartbreak for the ones lost bearable.

But the other side...the side of the human who takes the sad weary animal into their lives there is a story there too. 

I adopted Sweetie the day after taking my foster Clementine to Oklahoma...I found her on Petfinders from a group in rural Arkansas. Izard County Rescue Effort (ICARE). She had been brought to her foster mom by the sherrif who'd found a litter of puppies abandoned in a yard after a snow storm...she was 4 weeks old and her siblings had not fared as well, they were found... frozen.  She was the lone survivor.

Her foster mom Delories, a hard working woman had many animals to care for of her own on her farm. Yet she made time to participate in the volunteer group that rescues unwanted pets locally. She still takes in fosters, sometimes 6 or 8 at a time its hard work to do after a long day on the farm.

I met Delories half way from Layfayette to Kansas City and did the exchange in the parking lot of a store. It was a tear filled goodbye, Sweetie was 5 months old and had lived her whole life with Delories. But even through tears she was so pleased to meet my daughter and I...she said she knew Sweetie was going to be very, very happy.

Its been more than 9 years as I write this...and Sweetie is a very happy girl....and so am I.

I still occasionally write Delories and send pictures to update her but mostly to thank her again...and again not because she saved a puppy...because that choice was easy.  But I sing a quiet and heartfelt song of appreciation to her, for caring enough to be inconvenienced, for caring enough to take another one in when there was no room, for caring enough to stretch her last dollar, for caring enough to change my life

You see Sweetie has been a very important part of my history...she is the memory of my youngest learning to walk, the memory of my stroke and cancer- and how she was my very own therapy dog, the memory of snow and soccer games and running at the lake.... and of course the memory of countless nights of holding that big fat speckled dog and feeling a calm that has been her gift to me always,

Sweetie exists because someone cared...

Thank You Delories

To all of my friends who work so hard at saving homeless pets your legacy in kindness doesn't end with the animal in need, the people whose lives are touched by your handiwork are eternally grateful that you cared