My teachers are a wild and varied bunch – large and small; young and old; shorthaired and long; some vocal, some stoic and silent. They come here if they’re lucky and leave quickly if they are even luckier. What these residents of the East County Animal Shelter in Dublin have taught me is more than I’ve learned in any classroom. Go visit and they’ll have some lessons for you, too.
My young daughter, passionate about her volunteering duties, chats from the backseat as we push our way through busy traffic to get to the shelter. I drum my fi ngers on the steering wheel, thinking of dinner that must be made, carpools that must be kept, work to be done.
Finally we arrive to meet our first feline teacher for the day, her body sleek and supple despite the difficult life she must have lived as a stray. She is content to receive a scratch behind her ears, happy to rub against my daughter’s fingers through the bars, pleased with a small dose of affection and a clean bowl of water. Stop rushing around, she says. Can’t you see the sun coming through the window? Do you feel the warmth of it? Stay a moment and enjoy the comfort of a gentle hand. Slow down so you can feel the joy of the simple things.
Our next teacher is a delicate Shiba Inu with a fox-like face and rusty red fur. His tail curls into a perfect cinnamon bun shape and he dances on three delicate legs. The fourth is twisted behind him, useless and misshapen. How sad, we think, that his leg is so deformed, how pathetic that he must work so hard for balance as he walks on the leash. Not so, says this canine teacher. The joy is in the moving, however it is accomplished. Come with me to the grass and watch me frolic. He shows us that a disability is only as disabling as you allow it to be.
We walk down the row of cages and watch eager eyes stare back at us. I am sad to think of the cruelty visited on many of these animals, angry to think that some were let go because they were simply too much trouble. Many would have made a speedy trip home if only someone had taken the time to fasten a collar with an ID tag around their necks. I feel frustrated at the sheer numbers of unwanted animals that could have been prevented by spaying or neutering.
Then we meet another shelter cat. Look around you, she says, at the young teens who give of their time to come here and tend us. Go meet Nancy and Richard, who devote hours to loving and caring for us even when we are scared or misbehaving. Say hello to the people from Tri-Valley Animal Rescue who save us when our time at the shelter runs out, who foster us, who love us when it is inconvenient, who find us forever families when everyone else has turned away. Humans, even the young ones, can be saviors, she instructs us.
I have had wonderful teachers at the shelter, but there is so much more that I want to learn. I want to ask the big German Shepherd with the sad brown eyes: Where have you been, friend? Were you lost for so long that the tender tips of your ears burned and your coat grew loose around your ribs? Did you slip away unnoticed from your family or did they decide you were a bother and drop you somewhere far from home? What do you need, friend? A clean bowl of water, a bit of dry food, some freedom from this cage? Hopefully, someday, a person you can serve in your earnest, faithful way?
My daughter and I have many lessons left to learn from our shelter teachers, lessons of love and forgiveness and compassion. We don’t mind if they leave us midterm, though. With luck, these wise beings will go on to forever homes and families where they can continue their beautiful teaching.
Dana Mentink is a writer of Christian fiction and the proud owner of a rescue dog from Tri-Valley Animal Rescue (TVAR). Her books inevitably feature some sort of furry, feathery character who finds a happy ending. You can contact her via her website at www.danamentink.com.
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