Something I've been turning around in my mind for a while is: why do people "rescue" animals. I've just returned from the veterinarian with Baxter, a cast-out fellow that found refuge in my yard. Hopefully, I will be able to place him in a loving home, he is starved for affection! My own 3 cats have had just about enough of my bringing in strays or ferals and finding them homes, forgetting that they were once in the same position. In the 11 years I've had a backyard in Brooklyn I've learned about the massive stray and feral population in my neighborhood. I've met many people involved with TNR, volunteers and people that work at animal shelters. They've been selfless in their work, many devoting their lives and money to helping place these foundlings in homes or shelters, loving the ones deemed unlovable by the unseen people who have turned them out to meet their fate.
One unforgettable time I was walking my late dog Guinness around midnight a few days after a blizzard. The sky was the dark navy blue that comes when a waxing moon has set, the crystalline snow sparkled like diamonds in the street lights. Guinness nosed at what at first glance looked like an old crumpled sweater in a snowdrift. But it moved and I realized it was an orange tabby--he was barely alive! I swept him up and placed him under my coat, brought him indoors to food, water, and a makeshift bed. The next day I brought him to the vet and named him Jones, after the cat in Alien who met death and survived. He made it and went to a loving, loving home.
Another lasting memory is when I was waiting at the vet to pick up medication for Guinness, when some rescuers burst in with an emergency. The spokesman entered first to apprise the vet of the situation and we were all asked to please step aside to make way. I backed into a corner and the rest of the rescue crew carried in a massive pit bull whose bloody blanket fell away to reveal a leg with the meat torn clear off, the tibia bone plainly visible. Unbelievably, the dog was smiling and panting, happy to be petted and held by human beings!
There is the cliché of the crazy cat lady, or the people who love animals but hate people. I think what happens is that when you work with animals, you see the damage some people have done and it can make you angry. I wonder, why is it that some folks recognize that animals have feeling just as we do, and some folks do not see this? Do the people that lack empathy for animals also show the same disregard for people? Studies have long ago correlated that animal abusers often become abusers and even killers of people.
And what about the reverse, where does the compassion or compulsion to save animals come from? My own anecdotal evidence, not at all scientific, indicates that many rescuers have had some childhood trauma, or witnessed it. Maybe there is a need to help the helpless because in childhood one was unable to do that.
Well, I am happy to help animals whenever possible, and am thrilled that there are thousands of others doing the same. I'd like to add that many animal volunteers help people in need as well, we are all animals after all, aren't we?
