Pound Puppy

Long ago, He worked with animals.  One of the things I found humorous was that while he was not particularly fond of small children or animals, they adored him.  Babies stopped crying when he held them, though not his own, and stray dogs frequently followed him home.  One of his functions at work was occasionally euthanasia.  When an animal was sick, injured or dangerous, it was "put down" and he performed this function without a thought, without remorse.  Euthanasia was simply another part of the job. 

I've given a lot of thought to this over the past year in light of the Michael Vick story.  When an animal has been so mistreated, it is not fit to reenter society; it is cruel to expect that it can.  It is of benefit to society and to the animal to kill it, to end it's suffering.   You've seen examples in the dog pound, the lank, emaciated, quivering dog huddled in the corner of it's cement enclosure, desperately avoiding human interaction.  While well meaning people mean no harm, approaching such an animal is frightening and often results in growling or biting in self defense.  These dogs are not placable.  They can never again be sent to live with a human companion for fear of harm or litigation.  Maybe a lucky few find peole like Cesar Milan but the amount of dogs he can take in and save is finite.  Google "dog whisperer".  The first few pages are all Milan.  There's one dog whisperer per how many thousands of mistreated, maladjusted dogs?

The same goes for humans.  There's how many therapists available for exactly how many hundreds of thousands of mistreated, maladjusted people?  How many actually seek out or have the means to afford therapy?  Some of these "fighting dogs" cannot reenter society rather they reside along the fringes, watching and never quite fitting in.  Others chose euthanasia.  I hope the number that find "human whisperers" is growing.  I want to believe that like some of Vick's pit bulls, humans can be reformed, reemerging as people worth loving, worth knowing and that they learn to love and value themselves because for certain, their former owners did not! 

I don't have torn ears or a ravaged face from the bloody pits.  My scars are all mostly internal.  I sometimes run my fingers across the knot on my forearm over a break that was never properly set.  When an old fracture in my hip begins to throb, I can accurately foretell a thunderstorm.  Sometimes I'll nervously tangle my fingers in my hair searching out the lump from stitches and rub the tiny, even row like a talisman.  Even if these, and more, were not tangible, the internal scars run deeply leaving me unfit to be around others. 

But NOT my children.  That is different.  The relationship with them is primal, compassionate, protective.  More than mothers who have not seen and felt, I know and can shield them.  But from other adults, other men.  I don't want to be pushed.  And that's what I'm feeling.  I don't want to be someones.  I want to be my own.  I want ownership of my own body, my own thoughts, my own feelings.  It is too soon to be responsible for someone else's.