Hi,
Both myself and my wife spend time every week helping our local S.P.C.A. centre.
Little things like walking the dogs and as we are english we are asked to help the brits who come to give a dog a home here in france.
It really can be heart breaking when you see the same dogs not even given a second look,
Ie the ugly looking dogs as opposed to the cute little puppy ones & the old dogs that for no fault of their own have lost their owner due to the owners death or in a lot of cases the owner needing to go into care,
Dogs do have feelings and in these cases i offten see these dogs feeling both sad and lost,
They've had years of a certain way of life "be it right or wrong", such little things as perhaps a chocolate treat (chocolate is in fact bad for dogs but no everyone knows this)
or even the fireside to lay near on a cold night,
But all of a sudden the owners gone and the kennels are "Now" their new home,
Barking sounds all day long, and no matter how hard we try the smell of the kennels are always there, "A bit like hospitals always have a hospital smell about them"
I offten go home smelling like a compost heap,
So to spend a little time with the dogs we know have not got a very good chance of re-homing is why we give our time to this much needed help,
Yesterday I was amazed when i was showing a good young healthy dog to a couple and their daughter,
that the Mother said to the child "No not that one it's a black dog and black dogs are un-lucky!!!
Its not the dogs fault why it's such and such a colour, or age or breed,
Many a time i put the lead on a dog to take it for a "Walkies" And as we walk along the line of other dogs cages that one dog thinks its going to a new home and the spring in its step has to be seen,
its head is held high as it strides past and barks with joy "As it barks goodbye "
A return to its kennel is a reverse feeling, one it knows it hasn't been chosen this time or last time and the strides not the same, the heads now down and when im ready to go and take the next one out "my I'll see you next time is met by the sad look in the dogs eyes and im sure if they could talk the question would be "WHY".
Just as i offten can't understand "WHY" these dogs ever give any human a second chance after whats been done to these dogs in the first place,
When i do see the lucky ones diving into the back of cars as they leave to go to their new homes Im amazed that they ever get into a car so quicky "so willingly". to all of the luckyones.