Keeping Promises

Photo by Laura Richard

I am sitting here tonight working on the conclusion to the long, two year story of Rocca and Boy but now I have to take a break to watch the clock....

For the next 59 minutes, I can't work on my story because I am
sitting here watching the clock and I'm not a clock watcher, but
tonight, I can't do anything but watch the clock. I'm sitting here
with a rusty choke chain around my wrist as I type this and I am
counting down the minutes, only 58 left to go now, 58 minutes left
before I can take the rusty chain off my wrist and finally put it
away.

Rocca Zu's plane will be hitting the tarmac at Oakland International
Airport tonight at 8:49 Pacific Time, only 57 minutes more and when
Flight 285 finally pulls up to Terminal 1, I can finally put away
Rocca's rusted out collar, the one she was wearing the very first
time I spotted her over two years ago as she roamed the city, emaciated, and with the first pup I saw her with, one of at least
three litters I know she had while out there. During the time I
spent with her on the streets, trying to resocialize her and getting
to know her elusive running partner, Boy, I took that rusty collar of
hers and put it in my glove compartment and that was a litte over a
year ago. That collar meant everything to me because it meant that
Rocca was somebody's dog once and I knew that meant that I wasn't
going to quit until she got back home or if that wasn't possible,
until she was once again, somebody's dog....that collar was a promise
I had to keep.

Tonight, Rocca Zu is going home and she is going to be somebody's dog again. Adele, a volunteer from just outside of San Francisco adopted Rocca and so now in just 50 minutes, Rocca will finally be home and that means in just 48 minutes, I can put away that collar, a collar that is finally a promise kept.

"The Best Damn Dog Tracker in New Orleans"

Photo of me and "Boy" by Natalie Flood, ARNO Volunteer
Click on title above for full story, written by Pam Freni,
"The Best Damn Dog Tracker in New Orleans" published Feb. 15, 2008 on Best Friends Website

Buzzy and Me

Photo by Laura Richard

Me and "Buzzy" at Barkus parade 2008. Buzzy, just one of the loves of my life, is one of the "Lunchbox Gang" the crew that I socialized in place for three months before their capture in Spring, 2007

"The Present"

created by Mike Payne


Charlie's Ark "The Present" was sent to me by a very dear friend who lives in the UK and who wanted to share the touching story of The Present with her friends here in the United States. I have decided to share Charlie's Ark "The Present" with you because it is a beautiful presentation that has so much meaning especially at this time of year... when we give from the heart, we do understand that it is truly better to give than to receive.

Merry Christmas Mandy, thank you for sharing Mike's powerful message with the rest of the world.

Life and Death, Angel's Wings and everything in Between

Originally posted Christmas of 2006


"One man's life touches so many others, when he's not there it leaves an awfully big hole" Clarence the Angel in “It’s a Wonderful Life”


Last night, as I slowly began to settle in for this Christmas Eve night, I was, for the very first time breaking with tradition, a Christmas Eve tradition which I have kept for the past twenty-five years. This year, I made the decision to forego my annual viewing of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” the Frank Capra classic, a movie like no other and a movie which I have loved for more than those twenty-five years, each year, more than the last. And so, addiction being addiction, albeit it one to a warm fuzzy ending, after twenty-five years, I couldn’t just quit this habit cold turkey; truth be told, I did have the television on in the next room and my husband grew tired of yelling at me over the audio-only version. How do you completely toss out a time-honored tradition when it is one that just feels so darned good? Well, I couldn’t, and so, as in every year before, my ears were finely tuned to the next line, every line of the movie and I know them so well, but this year, as I said the lines nearly as perfectly as Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed did, the video portion of the evening’s entertainment was not the black and white film starring two Hollywood icons. No, the video portion this year, and it was in high-definition and in living color too, the video portion of It’s a Wonderful Life was the year-long reel-to-reel playing in my head....the movie? It’s a Wonderful Life, of course! It is a wonderful life, only, it’s my wonderful life.If you have seen this holiday classic once, or if you have watched it over and over and over again like me, then surely you must know why it is so beloved. But, if you haven’t, I will tell you that the movie, at its very core, drives home the message that each one of us matters to the world around us, regardless of whether or not we know it. Because each one of us influences the lives of others, and often in ways that we will never know, our own life’s success, any honorable and “good” man’s life success, is ultimately measured by all the lives we enrich, others’ lives, and not by the dollars which we collect in our bank accounts. Money, it turned out in the movie, really couldn’t bring Jimmy Stewart’s character, George Bailey, happiness, nevertheless, it was George’s wealth that did eventually change his perspective...his wealth of friendships. It is after years of living honorably and seemingly getting nowhere, that George finally questions his own existence, a question which many of us have grappled with at some point in our own lives, and only with the assistance of an angel, Clarence, does George come to realize that his really was a wonderful life. In his darkest hour, as he contemplates his life and possible death if he doesn’t screw that up too, he commits one more selfless act when he saves a man from drowning. Little did he know that the man he saved was really Clarence, sent to show George just why it is that his life matters so much. And of course, good triumphs and Clarence is able to earn his wings when George realizes that no matter what the future holds for him, he wants that future, he wants his life, for he has indeed had a wonderful life. If I live to be a hundred, I will always get that feeling in the pit of my stomach, I will always get goose-bumps on my skin, and I will always wipe away more than one tear, when as George’s life crisis is nearing a resolution, his brother Harry offers a toast to, “the richest man in town”.......George may not have amassed a fortune, instead he acquired a lifetime of friends because of how he effected their lives. It’s corny, It’s sappy, and it’s a happy ending; it’s the way life is meant to be and I must have always known that somehow, after all, I have seen the movie a few times. But, it’s this new version, my version of It’s a Wonderful Life that holds my interest this Christmas Eve.....who did I make a difference for this past year? Did I miss the little opportunities that don’t always announce themselves with bells and whistles? Did I fail miserably having made no difference at all, to anyone, this past year? Although it was never my intention to share any of the three following stories that are central to my version, as I keep hitting the rewind button of this past year, these are the three stories, the three people who are the only ones who can tell this version of Life and Death, Angels’ Wings and Everything in Between, because these are the three people that play on the screen of my mind of my wonderful life.Tony, I like to think, is someone who I made a difference for this past year, albeit a very small difference, a difference nevertheless It was last spring, nearly eight months into the long-term animal rescue efforts of which I was still taking part in, that I came across a scruffy man and his beagle. He was standing near an intersection, holding a sign, a sign I couldn’t bring myself to read because I was sure of what his message was: this man was homeless and I will not deny that the extra tug at my heart that day came because the homeless man shared his begging space with a small dog, a beagle. I have always believed that any homeless person who is traveling with or caring for an animal, has just got to have the biggest heart if he or she is willing to share such a meager life with another creature. So yes, I will admit that my U-turn that day was guaranteed by the sight of that beagle huddled up against that man. But, what unfolded that day was more than that, for the man I returned to offer money to, and for me as well.By the time I was able to complete the u-turn and return to the spot in which I had spotted the pair, both the man and his dog were gone. Fortunately, I saw them traveling along the highway and was able to catch up to them both as they turned into a parking lot of a small convenience store and headed toward the back. Tony, as it turned out, is a fifty-four year old Vietnam Veteran who has been homeless for twenty years. The beagle, obviously much younger, was a dog he came across, and rescued, following Katrina. I listened to his story about saving the dog and upon closer examination of the beagle, I was certain that this dog had no prior family and that the very best place for him was in fact with Tony, a man who so clearly loved him. Tony and I talked for some time that afternoon and although he never lifted his head completely enough to look me in the eyes, I think I saw him smile a time or two, and I am positive that I saw tears when I was able to give him the one thing he told me he was saving up his cash to buy: a tent. The bridge under which he and his pup slept at night was a great spot, he told me, but when it rained, the walls did leak and so he was going to buy a tent someday but he could only save a dollar or two at a time. I didn’t need any sign from up above, I didn’t need any bell to go off, I knew in an instant just why it was that I had come across Tony that day, a very unusual day for me because I was driving my husband’s truck instead of my own. So as I walked around the back of the truck and lifted the hatch, I’m not exactly sure what Tony expected when I told him that I had something for him, but I swear he nearly fainted on the spot when I pulled out and handed to him a brand new Coleman tent, my husband’s newest camping gear. After a few moments of wiping his face, he slowly walked over to me and told me that if he wasn’t so filthy, he would shake my hand and give me a proper thank you. It was my turn to fight back the tears and to fight back the enormous lump in my throat when I held out my hand and told him that I would be honored to shake his hand but no thanks were needed for the tent.........Tony took my hand and told me that the proper thanks he needed to give me were not for the tent. Although the tent was the best thing he could have ever imagined being given, he told me that the proper thanks he needed to give, the thanks that he felt a duty to give, were for my conversation, it had been so long since Tony had enjoyed a conversation.Bryan, I hope and pray, is a young man who will one day, someday, remember me and the time we spent together, but only for a brief second of time it will take for him to make the right call about a stranger he meets, a stranger who is different than he isIt was sometime near the end of summer, maybe around Labor Day, that I became aware of people, real live people, who had moved onto, or back onto S. Miro Street. S. Miro Street, as you may recall, is a street on which I spend much of my time trapping and feeding and trapping some more, but it is a deserted street, a lonely street, near the Charity Hospital off of Tulane Avenue in New Orleans. It had been so many months of time on S. Miro Street and then one day, a family appeared, an older black woman, a young black woman, and two children.Bryan was only twelve but already as tall as any adult and after noticing that he was the one watching me every evening, with an obvious look of “what the heck is she doing on my street?” I decided to just tell him, tell his mother and aunt and sister, and so I did. I introduced myself, told them what I was doing, why I was doing it and sure enough, it was Bryan who threw out question after question. “What do you do with the cats after you trap them?” “Why can’t you release the babies?” “What if you catch a dog or a racoon?”And so it went, for nearly six weeks. Bryan would meet me every night it seemed to help lay out traps, to take some packs of wet food on the nights we spotted baby kittens but were not quick enough to catch, to talk about his sixth grade class at Sophie B. Wright, to talk about Katrina and his friends he missed. Bryan and I never once talked about black or white, young or old, rich or poor, we just talked and his mom would wave to me every now and then and then one day they were gone. I pulled up one evening and a man was almost finished loading a U-Haul trailer with items he carried from the house in which I knew Bryan and his family lived. Finally, I got to meet Bryan’s father, a man who drove an 18 wheeler for a living and wasn’t home as much as he would like, but he was moving his family closer to him so that would change. I would miss Bryan but I knew that this was a good thing for him and for his family. I wondered if Bryan would miss his trapping adventures and it wasn’t long before I got my answer.It was nearly a month after Bryan and his family moved away, a sunny Saturday morning, during a solitary trapping session on S. Miro Street, I got word from Bryan, sort of. I was hunkered down on the side of a vacant glass factory warehouse, waiting silently for that tabby cat to make his appearance right into my trap, when a pickup truck driven by a middle-aged black man pulled up and ruined that trapping session, for the morning anyway. As I got up and walked over, ready to yet again explain who I was, just what I was doing there, and finally offer my rear bumper as all the credentials one would need (my Animal Rescue New Orleans bumper sticker, of course) I was slightly taken aback when this man, a man I had never met before, never seen before, rolled down his window and yelled out that he had something for me. This is going to be good, I thought, or really bad. When it became clear to the man that I intended to walk no further, he stepped out of his truck and completed the distance between us. “Hold out your hand” he commanded and what else could I do? As I held out my hand, determined that it would not shake, he held out his, and in my hand he placed 3 small sealed packets of Meow Mix, wet cat food. I looked at him, half expecting him to say that he saw them fall out of my truck, but instead, he told me that they were from Bryan, and he pointed to the house where Bryan used to live. He told me that Bryan told him to keep an eye out for that “crazy white lady” but then he leaned in toward me and told me that Bryan told him that he had a secret, he said Bryan told him I really wasn’t crazy at all, I was a hero. As I looked down at my hand, through the tears that I didn’t even try to hold back, the man told me that Bryan wanted him to be sure to get these packets to me and that I would know exactly what to do with them. I sure do know what to do with them Bryan, I’m going to save them for the next person who gives me a chance, the next person who doesn’t care that I am different, the next person who, like you did, judges me by my insides instead of the color of my outside. If the day ever comes that Bryan questions his own existence, if his Angel is determined to earn his own wings, he had better allow Bryan to revisit our time together, because Bryan made a difference for me, and I can only hope that ultimately, I made a difference for him.I am a person, still making every effort to keep this newly found heart open to the world and all, and who it has to offer, but I know that I have made a difference to me, the person I am, different than who I wasThe third person of my replayed movie of my mind, is me. And while Tony and Bryan required background information so that you might fully understand why they appear in my version of It’s a Wonderful Life, I will not. You already know me through my writings here and you know to an extent, who I am. But, you never knew who I was, as I didn’t begin sharing my thoughts with the rest of the world until I made that decision last Christmas that my heart was different and different it would stay. So, instead of background information, I will share with you a very brief but oh so significant exchange that recently took place between myself and someone who knows me well, my husband.On a recent evening, my husband and I were talking about another individual, someone who we both know through one of our employment situations. We were speaking about this individual when my husband suddenly made a comment about this person that caused me to have flashbacks and feelings of deja vu: my husband commented upon this person’s negativity and that he is just a negative person. I immediately lost all train of thought regarding our conversation and instead had all these memories come flooding back....you see, my husband has always told me how negative a person I am, but in that instant, I realized I hadn’t heard him say that recently. So, I stopped him mid sentence and I asked him for the reason....why didn’t he say that anymore to me? I asked him why he stopped telling me that I was one of the most negative people he knew........he laughed before he answered. My husband, my husband of seven years, a person who does know me well, better than most you would think, laughed and then looked at me and said “Because you’re not like that anymore, that’s not who you are anymore.”So this Christmas Eve, I will not be looking for Clarence to show me just how wonderful life really is, but I suspect he will have every opportunity to earn his wings right here in New Orleans, so many are still hurting so much.... I lost a friend this year who needed Clarence badly. Please God, send an army of Clarences to this city, only not to me. You see God, this year, after nearly forty of them, I no longer question my existence, in fact, it is one of the very few things that I am certain of and although it is difficult to define in concrete terms the answer to that question that many of us eventually face, for me, I do in fact have my answer and no longer question why I am here.I know why I am here and because of that, I face the world so differently than I did a year ago. Whereas I have always had a strength of my convictions to change the world, what I lacked in the past was the clarity of vision as to why to change that world, and as I have learned this past year, that clarity can only be obtained as part of an on-the-job training. It was my own conscious decision this time last year, when I resolved to open my heart to others, when I traded my tunnel vision for a pair of rose-colored glasses, it was that decision that, although unbeknownst to me at the time, was my fork in the road, and as I look back at the path, I can clearly see that I didn’t change direction, rather, the direction I took changed me. Shakespeare himself decided the world was his oyster, and I have never doubted that the world is in fact, my oyster. However, I also never counted on the strength of the heart being the strength that would dwarf all my convictions: to paraphrase Ghandi, Why change the world when I can be the change in the world? Until I opened my heart, I didn’t understand that the world is not here for me, I am here for the world, and that is the answer which Clarence might have helped me see with my eyes, but this Christmas I feel it with my heart. Why accept the world as my oyster, if instead, I can be its pearl? Clarence, if you are watching, keep going buddy, someone else earned his wings on me, and if you see him, tell him I said Thank You, and oh yes, Merry Christmas.

Bully Breeds

"I like that shade of orange on you, it goes well with your skin tone and your hair" she said that morning, and as I looked down at the shrimp-colored blazer, I smiled because, well because the color did look good on me. Today was a sunny day, and now it felt that way.

Was it squash? Maybe some sort of casserole? It was pumpkin, spiced pumpkin, the kind that you find in a pie and it was gloppy and goopy and it smelled bad right there on my shoulder. I hadn’t seen it coming, why would I? It was never intended for me, still, it hit me before it even got close to HIS target, the sniveling weak kid that he constantly picked on. Funny, pumpkin is orange colored isn’t it? Why was the only color I saw then, red?

"Do you have anything sharp in your pockets?" he asked and as I looked down through my tears, I could see that the orange blazer had no pockets. On the ride there, I wondered if I had made a mistake in not telling them about the machete in my truck, the one I carry to cut down vegetation on my dog-tracking efforts in post-Katrina New Orleans. I decided against it but with every effort to keep my voice from shaking, I heard the words "Can you check my bag? I sometimes carry a pocket-knife for protection and I don’t want to be in any more trouble once we get there" It was so dark outside the windows, was the tint that dark? I wondered if the world could see me in the back of that car?

I don’t even remember his name, only that he was the wormy kid, the one that Tommy Lathn mercilessly tortured and tormented. He was starting to cry, quietly, like he always did, he knew he was going to bleed today and he was trying to shrug it off, but, like he always did, he couldn’t, and so he cried, and he waited.....

I heard the commotion but my mind didn’t register what it was because I was watching the drunk out of the corner of my eye as I waited to be "intaked" that night, intaked into the jail, the prison, the penal system, Orleans Parish Prison, OPP. Your body reacts sometimes before your mind has time to tell it not to and so I turned but only for an instant because an instant was all I needed to see what I knew I wasn’t supposed to be seeing and so I turned back, yeah, that quick, but not quick enough.

He was half-way to rounding the corner of the cafeteria table, he was going to get him no matter what and if the pumpkin pie didn’t get there, than there were other ways to make that little kid cry today, only he never saw me in the way of his mission

He was about seven or eight feet tall and he was berating the man in front of him, the one shaking out his socks and shoes, for what I don’t know, nor did I care. The words he uttered weren’t enough I suppose, they didn’t quite evoke the humiliation factor that he was going for and so in the instant I saw it, all within the instant, he reached over and in one sleek movement, snapped him up by his waistband and hurled him to the brick floor below. And so I turned quickly away, but not quickly enough.

He didn’t even notice me, why would he? He was intent on making that kid cry more and cry harder and so he shrugged me off as I got closer, like an insect, just like an afterthought, but he should have thought about it first

It was an instant and it was a lifetime. As my legs buckled out from under me, presumably the result of the other prisoner’s flailing legs or arms, it seemed as if my knees hit the bricks at the same time my face hit the pavement but I don’t think that is possible, but, the thud of my heart in my chest and then the same thud in my mouth wasn’t possible either. With my hands still cuffed behind my back, I closed my eyes on the way down this surreal fall. Had I tried to get up? I don’t think I could have, I had nothing to brace myself with but I must have made the effort because the boot snapped my head back down as I watched the man with the socks and shoes through my tears and mouthed to him "shut up, just shut up" He would have to stop kicking him then wouldn’t he? He couldn’t step on his back anymore, "Get up you piece of shit" if he just shut up, right? "Just shut up, just shut up" I could hear it myself now so I know it was more than my words mouthed in silence and I couldn’t see him anymore because the salt of the tears forced me to squint so all I could see was the orange OPP jumpsuit so close, nearly touching my orange blazer, but I could feel his breath on my face, inches from mine as he incredibly defied the person who continued to kicked him in the groin "Get the fuck up you shitty mother-fucking piece of shit" And all the man with the shoes and socks would say, would keep saying was "You like that, do you?" and he was kicked and stomped I could barely make out the words but he refused to give up, he refused to shut up as I pleaded with him, silently, quietly and then only in my head to just shut up, but he wouldn’t he wouldn’t give up.....yes, the tall officer liked it, he liked it a hell of a lot, and so the kicks continued until a pinch snapped my eyes open and then instantly I was up in the air, moving, cartwheeling. Someone had grabbed me under the arm and in a whirl I was planted back on earth, pavement, bricks, the filthy prison floor. My eyes faced forward without fail but I heard it as he kicked him down the corridor and I still hear it, in my sleep..... when I sleep.

He never saw it coming, why would he? I was quicker than he was or than he expected me to be and as my hand clasped around his throat and the back of his head hit the cafeteria wall, his eyes told the story of a deer caught in the headlights, and for a moment, it was silent except for the wormy kid’s crying. But then it was all a roar as the sound of bone crunching on bone as my clenched up fist skidded off the end of his nose, and as my heart made the leap from my chest to my mouth, "son-of-a-bitch" could be heard streaming from somewhere in my gut, "you rotten son-of-a-bitch, you are never going to lay another finger on him, you got that you piece of shit" and the blood was hot and it was bright and it was about as pretty as the buds on my mother’s prized rosebushes. I was in a world of hurt and I knew it as the cafeteria monitor’s talons wrapped around my shirt collar and I swallowed the tears that were about to burst from my brain any moment "Do not cry, do not cry, do not cry" if Tommy Lathan sees me crying he beat me, and that’s not happening for all the trouble I’ve gotten myself into now. And so, it was silent, but only for a moment and then the roar was back, slow at first, quick and then quicker and as I was dragged off to face the principal, my fourth-grade teacher and eventually my parents, all I could hear was the roar, all I could smell was the roar, all I could taste was the roar and it was deafening and it was silent and it was maddening and it was validating and it was my roar "Lise, Lise, Lise, Lise, Lise, Lise, Lise....." and the forks, the knives, the spoons, every tool they had at their disposal, all banging on those lunch tables in unison, and it was unreal that it was mine, my chant, my name, my victory and I knew there was going to be hell to pay but for this one moment in time, I could have cared less because as those tears finally fell and those war chants grew dimmer and dimmer, I knew, noone was going to pick on the wormy kid again.

They say that there are only a few defining moments in a person’s life, the few instances that without a thought, without a hesitation, without a plan, a process, a blueprint, wrong or right, a person’s life is changed, the person for that matter is changed. Recently, I have thought about one of my moments, one of my defining and life-changing moments, I think about it when sleep won’t come. Tommy Lathan was the fourth-grade bully of Wolcott Street School, a lifetime ago, but some people stay with you and Tommy has ultimately been one of those people. He wreaked havoc wherever and whenever he wanted and for the most part, I escaped his tirades. Until I had seen enough, heard enough, been there for enough and I didn’t like pumpkin pie, not on my shoulder anyway. The funny thing is, I don’t remember the punishment, the world of hurt, I only remember the details of Tommy’s life that I soon learned and the details weren’t pretty. Tommy was your typical neglected and abused child and because of his crummy life, he was making everyone else’s life crummy. Maybe he forgot his pain by inflicting his own pain but at any rate my task was clear, I was to make friends with the fourth-grade bully and post-haste and so I did and Tommy and I came to an understanding, for awhile anyway. I don’t remember the specific details I only remember that eventually, Tommy went back to his bullying ways, that’s what bullys do, only he never missed a target again, or at least he never missed a target near me again. But truthfully, it wasn’t Tommy that stuck with me that day, it was the roar, and not the roar of the blood and the bone and the profanities I heard come up from my gut, it was instead the roar of right, the roar of agreement, the roar of get him, for doing the right thing and no matter how much trouble I got into, I knew that defending a wormy weakly kid against the fourth-grade bully had to be the right thing even if the pumpkin pie started it.

So now, thirty years later, I am the wormy weakly kid and my bully? the system. The ineffective NOPD, the New Orleans Police Department who in their noble efforts to fight a post-Katrina crime wave in this city have put nobility aside and instead work on their stats. Every article I have read, I have scoured, following my September 20, 2007 arrest for failure to provide proof of insurance, failure to provide proof of registration and failure to provide a driver’s license, how could I? when I wasn’t allowed to remove my hands from the steering wheel, all those articles showcasing what it’s like to be "locked-up" in New Orleans seems to point to a police force who are working toward numbers and sacrificing good arrests along the way. So looking back I no longer feel that wave of shock, shock that emanates from a handcuffed citizen who only moments before was looking for a lost dog, a dog that she had breathed, slept and dreamed for three full weeks since first losing him, emanates as she tells the officers over and over that noone else is hiding in her vehicle, emanate as she begs the officer to just look at her "Lost Dog" poster, emanates as she sobs in the back of the squad car, cuffed from behind because they had no cage, emanates as she tells herself to suck it up because where she is going is a place that will not tolerate wormy weakly kids, a jail, Orleans Parish Prison, OPP, or one of the worst jails in this country and emanate as she mutters "I just want my dog back" the whole ride there.....that shock no longer emanate from me and instead there is an icy coldness. And that coldness brings with it the full acceptance of my responsibility to carry everything I was asked for that night, everything that was in fact in my vehicle, only not in my dash box, the broken dash box, I reject the notion that a police "force" has blanket authority to make arrests to get those stats up and to make those arrests however they sit fit.

So while I have spent the past few weeks sleepless and worn out, and yes, afraid, no longer afraid of the criminals who do in fact continue to plague this already downtrodden city, but newly afraid of "the man" the men in blue, the ones who I thought were duty-bound to protect and serve...me, I have also spent time revisiting that cafeteria of my childhood and I can still hear those chants, "Lise, Lise, Lise, Lise, Lise...." and I know that the only difference that time has made is that it won’t be a fist that I wield this time, instead I am armed only with the knowledge that as an American citizen in addition to positive rights, I also have negative rights as well, I have the right to be left alone, the right to remain un-oppressed. So, I await my November court date with very little sleep, with the deep down knowledge that this is not over, and still with the unshakeable belief that someone just has to stand up for the wormy, weakly kid....in all of us.

Katrina Creatures & Critters: Katrina's Legacy

Click on the title of this post, Katrina Creatures & Critters: Katrina's Legacy

Thank You, Michael Vick

Whereas many of us, you know, the animal people, we understand the levels of cruelty that truly exist in the world, particularly as it rears its ugly head in the animal world, we also understand that every battle against such cruelty has been uphill, every victory has been so difficult to achieve. We live in a world where so many see the obvious cruelty in starving a dog but don't know, don't care or don't have the time to worry about the seals who are clubbed for their fur, ultimately to be used as a fashion accessory, a world which might love their own precious cats but doesn't see the inhumanity in seeking to eradicate ferals in their neighborhood and these juxtapositions that seem to exist never cease to amaze me, but the Michael Vick case has managed to amaze me even more so.

Finally, the levels of cruelty, inhumanity, depravity, viciousness, brutality and heinous acts that all of us know exists and goes on everyday as humans neglect, outright hurt, or look the other way as animals become their victims, finally, all of these horrible characteristics have been delivered, up close and personal, to the world and more importantly, mainstream America, and delivered in what so many thought to be a beautifully wrapped package....Michael Vick. Now, finally, mainstream America has the opportunity to just get it.....the levels of cruelty, inhumanity, depravity, viciousness, brutality and heinous acts aren't really just a problem for those animal people to fight and they aren't really just things that go on in the darkest corners of the ghettos, slums, projects, you know, the bad part of town. No, now, and finally, mainstream America gets to see what we already knew, that these horrible crimes, these horrible acts and these horrible ways of thinking are everywhere and that includes mainstream America in all its middle-class, two door garage neighborhoods. There might not be a Bad Newz Kennels on your block, but if you pay attention, you can bet that somewhere and anywhere and everywhere on your own block, there are in fact shades of gray which exist as to what each and every one us considers cruelty and inhumanity to be. Now and finally, mainstream America has the opportunity to just get it..... a man with a gift, a gift that allows him to sign his name to a piece of paper and to collect $130 million dollars to show up on Sundays and throw a ball down the field, a gift that makes so many corporate pots of gold his for the taking and in exchange for only his name, a man with gift trades it all away, all of it except for that gift, which ironically remains, he trades it all away and just so that he can watch living breathing creatures who have no choice, creatures he has made life and death decisions for, watch them as they draw blood and end life.
And the shiny bow on top of that pretty little gift package?....the man with such a gift, the one who is willing to trade all of his pots of gold away, needed more than that blood and that death, he had to have more of it, and so manufactured it, death that is, and he took his own primal and perverse satisfaction in finding novel ways to manufacture that death......a man with such a gift had to have more than an injection or even a bullet, he needed electricity and nooses and blunt trauma, and those are only the highs, rather the lows, of depravity and cruelty and inhumanity that we know about.

Now and finally, and thanks to that gift-wrapped package, there seems to be, and historically so, a consensus, a universal thinking as to what mainstream America will not turn their heads from and not turn their channels from and what they will not tolerate and accept and will not allow, and now and finally, it does my own heart some good to see that mainstream America seems to have drawn its line in the sand, seems to have said, "Enough" There can be no mistaking the irony of the setting in which that line in the sand was drawn........mainstream America seems to have found and stated its universal "Enough" even at the expense of losing one of the most beautifully wrapped gift-packages it has, even at the expense of altering the course of one its most enduring past-times, Sunday with the NFL ...........so, for what this gift-wrapped package has delivered to mainstream America, and ultimately, for what that package has delivered for us, you know, the ones who have been trying to get mainstream America to just get it, I want to say, Thank You, Michael Vick....I think that they finally get it.