May 24, 2001 ~ Man's best friend
It's been awhile since I've been this angry. It takes a lot to make me mad. Here's the deal... my former neighbor, "Bill," has Alzheimer's. His condition has deteriorated to the point that he can no longer take care of himself or live alone, so about five months ago, he moved to his son "Bob's" home, about 120 miles away. During the time that he lived alone here, his son "Joe" thought it would be a fine idea to give his dad a couple of dogs, so he would have some company. A nice thought, but Bill was not really able to care for himself, much less any pets. And when Bill had to move away, neither son wanted to take the dogs, so they just left them here. They asked a friend to come by and feed them, and that was that. That might not have been SO bad, if they had been confined to a fenced yard, but they have been allowed to roam free. People here have this thing about animals and freedom. Funny thing, that. I guess it depends which side of the fence you're on. Some dogs have this nasty habit of chasing cows, and when that happens, they tend to die young. People shoot them. It's always struck me as odd, the people who thought their dog's "freedom" was more important than their neighbor's livelihood. And... dogs being dogs, they sometimes like to hunt and kill other animals, such as squirrels, rabbits, or unfortunately, cats. It would be one thing if a cat wandered into a dog's back yard... that I could understand. You can't say too much about that. The cat shouldn't have been there, right?
Two days ago, Bill's abandoned dogs practically ripped my cat to pieces, right in my front yard. Now, it's not as if we're just next door. These dogs had to cross several pastures to get here. When I heard the sounds of the struggle, I ran outside to see what was wrong. That's when I saw Bill's dogs with Sam in their mouths, Sam yowling in pain. I screamed at the dogs and they dropped Sam. They quickly ran away. I believe I could have strangled them with my bare hands, such was my fury at that moment.
Sammy didn't seem to be too badly hurt, at first. It looked like there were only surface wounds. The vet thought the same thing... at first. But it turned out that Sam was severely injured, perhaps mortally wounded. Had I known it was so bad, I probably would have had him put to sleep. But the vet tried to put everything back together, stitched him up, and we are hoping for the best. At the moment, we're looking at a $400 vet bill, and we aren't done yet.
Sam is still in very bad shape, and he is in pain, the kind of pain that no animal should have to endure. What makes this so hard is that this should never have happened. I don't blame Bill; he probably doesn't even know he had a farm, much less dogs. I DO blame the people who thought it would be a good idea to give this ill person these large dogs, and who later decided it would be okay to just leave them here. It may not seem very neighborly, since Bill and his wife were my good friends, but I expect Bill's sons to pay the vet bills. They may not do it, but I expect them to. They DID remove the dogs, and I didn't even ask what they did with them. They may have been put to sleep, and if that's the case, I'm sorry. It wasn't really their fault; they were just doing what dogs do. But people never cease to amaze me, both with their goodness, and sometimes, with their stupidity. I'm just sorry that Sam has to suffer because of the stupidity of humans.
If you are wondering why no one called animal control about this situation, it's because there IS no animal control. And quite honestly, I didn't even know the dogs were still here. But when I saw them the other night, I recognized them. The next day, I drove by Bill's empty house, got out of my truck, walked to the back door, and sure enough, the dogs were right there in the carport.
They're gone now, and I hope that our other cats are safer for it. We've had seven cats disappear these last few months. We didn't know what was going on. Coyotes, we thought. And maybe so, some of the time. But I wonder... how many of them were killed by man's best friend?
One is too many.
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