Making a difference one-by-one

The first time I met Rocket, he was laying in a ditch on the side of the road with three people standing around him. As I approached, he made eye contact and wagged his tail a bit. A good sign.

It was a Sunday afternoon. Andi, a fellow animal rescuer and her husband had been out on their motorcycle when they drove past a woman pulled to the side of the road and standing outside her vehicle. Thinking she might need some help, they pulled over. What they found was that the woman was from out-of-town; she was just passing through. As she was driving, she noticed a small movement out the corner of her eye in the ditch. In a quick glance, she realized it was a brown dog. He was lifting his head. Being a dog lover, she pulled over to see what she could do.

Andi and Kenneth saw her… and pulled over to see what they could do.

Because they were on a motorcycle, there wasn’t much they could do, so they called me. I loaded some emergency supplies and a backboard into my car and headed out.

We gently moved the dog onto the backboard and loaded him into my car. I drove him to a vet tech’s house where she did a preliminary exam. She administered some meds to stabilize him until we could get him into one of the clinics in the morning that works with us on our rescues.

Long story short and a few months later, Rocket was returned to his original home some 50 miles away where he has been reunited with his other doggie playmates. His broken leg is healing, he is regaining motion in his foot and he is a rocket man zooming around his yard once again.

The simple beauty of the story is the ripple effect a few people had on this gentle soul. Had the first woman not spotted Rocket in the ditch and stopped, he may well have eventually died there. The vets working on him thought he had already been there for a few days.

This is the spirit of volunteerism and community that can make the difference in the lives of our companion animals. It is work that is done one-by-one. While this may seem like slow progress, to the animals saved, it’s more than they had. So it is a good place to start.

A few years ago, rescuers and shelters counted on people coming to them to adopt. But the internet has changed all that. We now create websites to introduce people to our adoptable animals. And with social media, we can now GO OUT TO THE PEOPLE with our messages and their stories. We can share our adoptees with many more people in many more places. In turn, those people can share the messages with their friends and their friends can pass it along still further.

We are able to extend our reach until we find that forever home whether it is down the road, across the country or on another continent. We are no longer limited to our immediate community.

Statistics for the United States show that there are currently 20 million households. On average, the US kills about 4 million cats and dogs a year. There are homes out there for our companion animals. We just need to move beyond the borders we have known in the past and grasp all the opportunities available to us to find homes.

The key to this is people and participation.

People that work in whatever capacity is comfortable for them: rescuer, foster, adopter, other. Let’s Adopt! Canada is looking for these people as we expand our reach throughout Canada and redefine what “community” is. Let us know what talents you have to offer. We’re listening.

Join us! on Facebook.

Let’s not stop until all shelters are empty and every dog and cat has a loving home!

Ciao, Holly