Embrace your Fears

My Friend Jackie is an animal lover to the EXTREME. She donates to several no kill animal shelters and she is always worried about every animal in town. She shares lots of animal posts on Facebook. She shares about finding dogs their forever homes, transporting dogs, shelters that need items, and lost dogs to the point of being annoying but then I realized how annoying I could be posting about my kids and my life. I embraced our differences and we became instant friends.

So when Jackie invited me to volunteer at an Animal Shelter I was thinking this is perfect, something out of my comfort zone. As this day got closer I started freaking out because cats really scare me. They are so evil. Most people are scared of spiders, clowns or snakes. Not me, mine would be cats.

On the way to meet Jackie at Lara's House in Mexia a black cat ran across the road.  I'm very superstitious so I was like, this isn't going to go well at all. When we showed up at Lara's House it was pouring down rain. Of course we had no rain coats or boots. There were two ladies cleaning dog pens. There names were Betsie and Freddie. They were so sweet and kept saying we could come back when it stopped raining. I looked at Jackie and was like no if they are doing we will do it. To me it is all about the experience.

I guess out of habit I looked at the water buckets first. Growing up with horses my dad would always say,  "if you wouldn't drink out of it, then don't make the horse drink it." It was raining but the bowls were clean and full. I was impressed! A lot of the food bowls had wet food in them and Betsie and Freddie were sick over the fact that food was going to waste because they desperately need food at the shelter. The dumped it out anyway, washed out the buckets, and we put fresh food back out. Now it was time to clean the poop. Surprisingly with all the rain the pens were not that bad. Cleaning poop didn't take long at all. At this point I was exhausted and had only been there less then two hours.

Next was the cats. I was ready mentally and physically. When we opened the cat sanctuary we were greeted by the coolest cat lady ever her name was Melinda. She was so passionate about cats she took the time to show us how to clean cages and the sanctuary. I cleaned around 15 cat litter boxes. When I sat on this cute bench in the sanctuary for a small break I was surrounded by 40 cats looking at me. I was freaking out and needed air.

As I made my way out the door I was doing my gagging, almost throwing up, pucking bit. I'm sure most have heard it. It is pretty dramatic. I saw a car pull up and Betsie and Freddie walked over and I noticed they were get a dog out of the SUV. Turns out a family was returning the dog because even though the kids and family loved it and it was almost potty trained it occasionally peed on things. They had had the dog for three weeks before they returned it. I headed over as man drove out of the driveway and realized the dog looked so scared.  I was heart broken. How is it that I have been here for less then 4 hours and I'm crying over a dog being returned?? So you want to know what was really sad? That was the second dog to be returned in the short time we were there. The other one was returned because it keep getting out of the fence.

I wanted to walk some dogs but I was totally exhausted. The true hero's were the volunteers. After being soaked from the rain, watching animals they thought have forever homes returned, and cleaning crap all day, they told us goodbye as they headed out to walk dogs. I was very impressed with Lara's House. They desperately need dog and cat food and volunteers. Please think about it even if it is a one time thing. They are blessed for the help.

I want to thank Jackie and Lara's House for a wonderful day. Jackie, I'm so blessed I took the time to understand your passion. You have made me more compassionate and understanding towards our  four legged friends. I'm a better person for knowing you.

I needed to be back at 3:30 for the PTO meeting where they were electing officers. On my way home Matt asked me to stop at Farrar to pick something up at the water plant. I wasn't paying attention and drove in to a HUGE pot hole full of water. My right back tire wasn't even touching the ground and the left side of the truck was underwater at an angle. I crawled out the passenger side door. I of course knew I didn't have any service on my phone and when I looked I should have also guessed it was dead. Thank God for Navasota River Authority for pulling me out. You guessed it, I missed the meeting.

I'm home already in my PJ's after a shower. I am sitting here thinking about all the dogs and cats that need forever homes. I took a few pictures of my favorite dogs. Check out Lara's House on Facebook to adopt one today.