Hey guys, it's Jen, I'm back in town.
For those of you who didn't know I left town, I've been gone and I've been back and I've actually restarted my social media presence in all this time. Please find me and follow me so that I can raise money for my legal stuff, which if you follow me and find me, you'll learn more about it. Anyway, I'm back.
I'm rolling Sophie down the street and I come to a small auto body shop and there's this little dog with gigantic ears, a hoodie and a set of pearls on just sitting there in the driveway, and the people at the body shop are talking to her. I say, Oh, how cute. It's bring your dog to work day. And they said, Oh no, this isn't one of ours. She just walked up here and sat down. I said, Oh no, I'll take her! since I'm already walking my dog on her cart that can accommodate two small dogs, and she won't even know the second dog is there!
I take this dog with me and for the next couple of hours, I take her around the neighborhood trying to figure out where she lives, to see if she indicates anywhere. She indicates a few times, but she really just seems to be having the time of her life on the trip. I did notice that she was scared of the busier streets, and that meant that she was somewhere up the hill, and I don't think she would have crossed a busy street by herself.
I went up the hill and asked people who were also walking dogs if they recognized her and nobody really did, except for one person who I talked to actually, at the base of the hill, they'd said that they probably thought they saw the dog like maybe a year ago. Like this is, this is a dog that they think they've seen before, but it's not a regular. I exchanged numbers and I said, I'd let them know, if I got any information or if I made a post or anything, I'd send it to them. And then I continued on my way.
And then I ran into somebody else with the dog who said, you know, that's so interesting. I just reunited a lost dog with its owner last week and they started giving me suggestions for like, certain things on to do on Facebook. And I don't have a Facebook and I won't get on Facebook to do that. Actually thinking about doing that, going on Facebook and making a public post is terrifying; I don't want to get on Facebook to post about this dog, because a bunch of fucking people are going to tell me what I should do differently or better or what I've already done wrong. Not into that!
But I’d checked lost and found on Craigslist, and I checked PawBoost, and I hadn't seen anything for her in that timeframe. This woman was more equipped to handle a reunification situation than I was. So I gave her the dog.
Well, she asked, would you, do you want me to take the dog for you? And I, I went really?! And I tried not to sound too eager to like get rid of this poor little cute baby. I didn't want her to hear me.
I wasn't really interested in having that as a task to do. It turns out it would have been fucking easy because the owners put up a flyer for her right outside my house, which I saw the next morning. I wrote to the woman to whom I gave the dog and I said, Hey, guess what? I saw their flyer! and I sent it to her. And she told me that she'd already been in contact with them and they've already been reunited! And I was like, wow, they went out right away to print flyers and we must have just missed each other. That's crazy.
The other woman who I had crossed paths with and exchanged information with, I told her that I had given the dog to somebody who had more rescue resources and connections. And she was like, Oh no, I hope that the dog isn't turned into the shelter already. And I hope, Oh, I hope they find its owner before… It was just an immediately negative reaction, and I have a real problem with that.
I have a real problem with a negative reaction to the shelter system. Because the truth is the county shelter is where your animal is going to go first if it's lost. Unless somebody decides to immediately re-home it, or they take it to a vet and they find your microchip, it's going to go to the county. And that is the best way to find it, outside of local groups and things like that. This is not the first time I've experienced a negative reaction to the idea. And also when I said rescue, I meant rescue. I didn't mean that she would like— the confusion, the conflation, also of the negativity of a rescue with the county shelter is also very annoying. (I'm trying to remember if I thought her dog looked purebred. I can't remember.)
People are convinced that county shelters everywhere are just like laying dogs out left and right, or immediately. They act as though the shelter isn't one of the safest and best options for a pet to be reunited with its owner if it doesn't have a chip or anything like that. And honestly, if it does have a chip, the shelter is going to be the one who can call.
I've experienced this before when I lived in Atlanta and I found a cat in a parking lot in downtown. And I mean, DownTown-downtown, like main streets, subway stops; It was the hotel area.
There was just this ginger cat hanging out, crying. He came up to me in the parking lot, and I brought him home, because it is not safe out there for a cat, especially not a cat that's friendly like that and doesn't seem to have any street training.
At the time, I was volunteering with the Fulton County Animal Shelter; they knew me, so I could bring the cat in and they would take care of him. Before I did that, my ex-husband posted on Facebook— because I still wasn't on Facebook even back then— you know, for the downtown neighborhoods. Does anybody recognize this cat? If not, we're going to take them to Fulton County Shelter.
And people began flooding— fuh-ludding! his post with anti-shelter rhetoric and other options that actually just aren't options. People say, why don't you do the Humane Society instead, which, what do you think that is, if not a charitable shelter? But also the Humane Society does not take strays, they only take owner surrenders? The Humane Society itself is a rescue as opposed to a shelter run by the county. What about this rescue? What about that rescue? Those rescues pull from a county shelter at which the animals are registered first. Also, to be given the opportunity to be checked out by a vet, to check them for shit, to check to see if they're sterilized.
People act as though as soon as the animal goes to the vet, it gets turned into a hamburger. And it's just an incorrect perception—Did I say the vet?
People act as though[x2] as soon as an animal goes to the county shelter, that it gets turned into a hamburger. If that were the case, then shelters wouldn't be overcrowded.
People also act as though it's a dead end for animals. It's only a dead end for animals who didn't have a home in the first place; It's not a dead end for animals whose owners are looking for them. It's just such a strange [opinion]… I hate it. I hate it so much.
Speaking of [x3] my experience in a rescue… Beans, the cat I found on the bus, she's so interesting because she's a city cat. She was born, oh gosh, I do not know where she was born exactly. But she is a new soul, an innocent little spirit who is truly like a natural innocent spirit. Her perceptions of the world and her fear of certain things were initially so confusing, because they weren't based in reality. Like she had a strangely innate fear of ceiling fans. And I said, kitten, did somebody throw you into a ceiling fan? Like what's wrong with you? What's wrong with you? And it turns out (probably, I assume, from my intuitiveness) that she thinks the fan is a bird. She thinks the fan is a bird of prey coming down for her. It's so much more innocent and natural than it first seems! And I think it's so cute that she's a little nature girl. Even though I found her in a grocery bag on the bus.
I took her to see if she was chipped. (She wasn't chipped.) She also didn't have a spay scar, and sure enough, she hit puberty in my house. And I wasn't about to turn her in to the shelter because again, the shelters are overcrowded.
But if your animal is lost, it's the best place to find them. Did I think this cat was lost? No. I think this cat was purposefully and safely misplaced to find a better life. With me! But if I for some reason thought this cat had a home, I would have taken it to a shelter because they are better equipped than I to do a health workup and go into the city systems and find the owner.
It's just strange. It's just the panic is so strange. Oh, I hope they're reunited and it's not too late and she's in the shelter already. Why would you think that? I told you that the other woman was going to handle it. Like, what is your control issue? That's so annoying. Get therapy.
[~*guitar solo*~]
