Monday, January 26, 2015

Why do bad people happen to good dogs?


....I found this unposted blog from what I think is about summer of 2011, I somewhat picked up where I left off

I started this blog about a year ago, and for some reason thought I would have a ton of time on my hands to write about my experiences with dogs. Obviously this is not the case, late August is when my time is filled with late nights and early mornings getting ready for another obsession in my life, football. Being in sports marketing is a great job, and the end result is an incredible rush of satisfaction each Saturday when toe meets leather here in the south. Crazy enough, my obsession with football and my job does play into this story I'm about to tell, because it almost didn't come to be.
Nick and I had just adopted out Tucker (foster #11) on a Thursday, and we both had a conversation about how Tucker would be the last foster I would have for a while. Once football season starts, I'm never home. I work six to seven days a week and 12 hour days, the burden of a sometimes crazy foster would be all on my husband, and that's just not fair. It was Sunday afternoon and I got a text from the adoption coordinator about a dog in South GA that was in a shelter and very bad off, she sent me a picture and I just couldn't say NO. Fast forward a few hours and Junior entered our world. We called him Junior because he looks like Balco in the face, he's a flashy fawn with a flashy personality and the name just came to me.
Junior is a fantastic dog, and won our hearts over immediately with his classic boxer wiggle, smooshy face and the ability to just make you laugh. I believe it was day two of having Junior that Nick said to me, "this dog is cool, I would keep him" and it was day three that he said "it sucks that bad people happen to good dogs, because Junior is an awesome dog" and from that statement on, I've been thinking about those words ever since.
It's a pretty powerful statement, because being that we're a foster home for these incredible animals, it is so true. We've been blessed in the almost two years to have Mack, Elliot, Wilson, Buster, Ozzy, Onxy, Tonka, Cash, Oprah, Frank, Tucker and Junior to come through our house for us to find forever homes for. Each with their own stories and own set of problems and are all very unique, except for one thing: Someone gave up on them. People suck, there is no doubt about it

....So fast forward, again, this time about three years, and we haven't had a foster since. After Junior we brought in Trooper, who just about broke my heart in every different way. Again, a dog I simply thought I would keep, until just the right family came along and allowed him to live a fabulous life. It wasn't until Ripken, one of the prettiest boxers we had, brought me to my tipping point. I know there was a good dog in there, but at the time, I was complexity worn out and exhausted with life, and we had to pass him along to another foster home. I couldn't handle his anxiety, his inability to get along with my dogs and the constant uneasy feeling he (and I) had. I had given up on him and it crushed me, but at the same time, it stood for a few things I had given up for me. I was in a strange place and needed some saving of my own.

Little did I know, a few months later, someone would rescue me. A tall, dark, handsome, and incredibly fat and out of shape....horse. Yes, you read that right, in a swing of what must have been karma repaying my husband and I for all the right things we had done in life, Jackson found me.

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