My first glimpse of Big Red was a little after midnight on a bitterly cold night. I was anxious to get home after traveling the sixty-mile commute from my job at the post office in Dallas and was barely a mile away. My headlights picked up movement on the side of the road and I slowed immediately, thinking it might be a deer because of its size. But no. She was as big as a doe but she was a great big ole hound dog or perhaps a greyhound. Her backbone was humped up in the familiar painful arch of a shorthaired dog that is very cold and she was so thin the outline of every rib was clearly visible. To make matters worse, she had no hair!
I felt such compassion for the obvious suffering of this wretched creature, I could feel the tears rolling down my cheeks. I could never get used to it, though what I was seeing was a common sight, and my heart was aching for her. I knew exactly what had happened. People who live in the country have to deal with it all time. Refusing the option of taking her to a humane animal shelter, her unfeeling owner chose to “drop” her off out there, easing his conscience by assuring himself that someone would take pity on her and give her a home.
I stopped the car and got out but when she saw me, not trusting me, she loped across the field and of course, I couldn’t follow her there. When a dog has been “dropped” like that, it has a very tough time trying to find something to eat. Residents in the area, having been victims too often of dog-dumping, don’t want another dog to feed so they run the stray off, yelling at them if they approach their home. And if they do have dogs of their own, many sic them on the stray thus making it even more fearful. They definitely won’t feed the dog because everyone knows if you do that, the dog will stay right there.
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