So often when I find myself in a really great mood, or laughing with friends...I think about what the animals are going through in the shelter right at that very moment.
It doesn't necessarily bring me down, rather, it makes me relish those moments even more. It also stirs in me a renewed strength and determination to do something for them.
The animals that were given up because their owners are moving, or the cat scratched the furniture, or they got a new, younger pet, or, it was getting too old, too incontinent, too loud, too dirty, not cute anymore, not fun anymore. For some time the pet was safe, fed, cared for and possibly loved - then one day it goes for a ride in the car, it's excited. Until from inside the cold stale cage, it watches while their loved one walks away forever.
That's the part that kills me. Imagining how scared and confused they are. If they were human, they'd internalize and wonder what on earth they did wrong. Like when a child's parents divorce, and it becomes a personal blow, a devastation sometimes that is carried around with them through adulthood, until they are capable of understanding that it had nothing to do with them, it was merely between the parents.
There are other times when I can't stop thinking about the shelter animals, and it does act like a filter for joy, how can I let joy in thinking of them?
But we're human, and this is what we do, we move on, and we'll be happy no matter what others are going through. It's about us, about the now, the moment, right?
If you see images of people being brutally harmed and killed in other countries for no reason, or dying from a preventable disease, we may feel something briefly, or we may act. But what happens when the images are out of view? Do we naturally seek out ways to help? Or are we always trying to escape the sad and horrible truths that occur every minute in this world?
This is not meant to be a cynical slant here. I am truly intent on understanding why certain crises continue - when it is so painfully obvious to me that they could have come to an end some time ago. All it takes sometimes is to pay a little more attention.
So while you are enjoying your day to day, and everything in between - please be open to a wider landscape. Including all the natural beauty in everything. And maybe we'll find beauty in opening up a little more, and helping, in any way we can.
p.s. these are current photos of real dogs and cats in shelters right this very minute.
