As I drive back and forth to the museum where I work, I pass a new neighbor who has fenced off his yard to accomodate several llamas and a newfoundland, a big white dog. Nearly every time I pass this yard, the dog lays with his back to the road pressed against the chain link fence where he lives. He does have a dog house where I dread to think he's left every night to sleep regardless of the temperature. Why do people take in a dog and then leave it in a cage alone day and night day after day. When I was a teenager I used to visit the Central Park Zoo. There were several large cats on display and they lived in concrete and steel cages where they walked back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth for all the world to see how, when a living creature is confined to a cage, it looses its mind. The entire Universe shrinks when a child, a living creature, or the earth itself is abused, neglected, destroyed.
As I rode past my big white dog with every passing day I became anxious. What do I do, how can I help this dog out its cage. It stayed with me, leaving me anxious on my way into town and as soon as I forgot about it busy doing my stuff, I'd drive home only to be reminded again. So what I did was start to talk about him with my own beloved dog. I told my dog how I felt about the big white dog and asked if together, my beloved dog and I, might send loving thoughts to the big white dog letting him know we were thinking of him, that he wasn't alone and that if we could, we'd find a way to help him out.
Well, lo and behold, as I rode to work this morning, I came slowly over the rise in the road and glanced at my big white dog and there he was, for the first time, standing and looking my way. Then to my joy and relief, he began to bark at me and wag his tail and talk talk talk to me. I stopped my car by the side of the road and opened the window and talked to him (he's off in the distance really). All the time he barked and wagged his tail. I am honored.