Ol' Maude

 Continued from,  "DAMAGE  CONTROL." 

Ol '  Maude

After grabbing two water bottles from the fridge and two leashes off the hook on the wall Julia and Sally went into the kennel area and walked down ‘dog-isle’. About halfway Julia stopped, opened a gate and put a leash on a little beagle pup for Sally then went to the large dog section. She went to the last kennel on the left, knelt down, and spoke softly to Ol’ Maude, an old retriever they found last year beaten and almost starved to death. Maude was about ten years old and nobody seemed interested in adopting the old dog so Julia did. Ol’ Maude was Julia’s favorite and she got real excited when Julia stood up and opened her gate. She wagged her tail so hard it swayed her whole backside back and forth and she almost lost her balance. She loved her walks with Julia everyday. 
     With people in tow, the dogs lead the way out the side door, around the agility course and up the well-worn trail that meandered through the trees. Ol’ Maude took point position with her keen nose and sharp eyes, always looking and smelling for any signs of danger, or food. This was her pack and she had a job to do.
     Julia and Sally followed behind their dogs with an easy walk and some small talk until they came to a fork in the trail. Julia paused for a moment. “What time is your meeting with Dr. Amy?”

     “Three o’clock.” Sally said.

     Julia looked at her watch then back to Sally, “We’d better take the short trail this time.” She then tugged the leash to the left with two easy snaps of her wrist and said “Haw,” to Ol’ Maude, who knew the lingo and headed off onto the trail to the left.

     Sally looked over and asked, “How long have you lived at the farm Julia?”

     “Oh, for about a year now, my real home is in W.Va. Did you know that J.F., Christina’s dad lives right next me and that’s where Christina grew up, and that Buddy always came down for the summers and that’s how we became best friends?”

     “So how come you’re here, don’t you miss being home?”

     “Yeah, I miss home, but this is important, helping Christina, Buddy, and Cathy get this Animal Shelter going.” Julia went off in thought for a second, “Ya know what I really miss the most is watching the wild mustangs frolic in the creek late in the evenings, with the moonlight reflecting off the water. It looks like a liquid silver ribbon running back and forth through the valley. It’s the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.”

     Sally's eyes lit up, “YOU have wild mustangs?”

     “Yep, ‘bout 25 of them, all ranging free in the upper meadows behind J.F.s cabin. We bring them down every year for the rodeos.”

     “Rodeos!" Sally said with disgust. "That’s mean; I saw how they are so mean to those horses on TV.”

     “Nobody’s mean to my horses! I’m with them most of the time and they really like it. They spend all year looking forward for rodeo season to begin so they can buck those cowboys off their backs and put 'em in the dirt on their butts.” Julia smiled and looked over to Sally, “Do you ride?”

     “No, I’ve always wanted to but…”

     “Well how about tonight, after supper, you can come along with me and Buddy for a little trail ride.”

     “Sure!” Sally piped up with enthusiasm. “Julia? Will you teach me to barrel race like you do?”

     “I think that might be something we can work towards. Yeah! That’s good idea, Sally.”

They reached the half waypoint of the trail where it turned and followed along side the babbling creek for a short bit before winding back into the woods towards the shelter.

     “Hey, you want to switch dogs?” Julia asked as she held out her leash towards Sally.

     “Sure, I’ll take the lead with Ol’ Maude” she said, and they switched dogs and positions. Sally admired the way Ol’ Maude just moseyed along, smelling everything there was to smell when she noticed a big scar on her hind leg, “What’s that Julia?” she asked, pointing to the scar.

     “That’s an old battle wound Maude carries with her. She was abused and beaten pretty bad before we found her.”

     Sally stared at the scar that ran from the top of the left hip all the way down to her knee, “Who would ever hurt a dog like Ol’ Maude?”

     “I don’t know,” Julia said vehemently. “But they sure as heck wouldn’t if I was around.” She looked over to Sally then off to the side and threw out a swift round kick at some imagined dog abuser and shouted out simultaneously, “UHAAUUH!!!”

     Sally then imitated Julia’s kick with one of her own, “My name is Ol’ Maude, and you will not hurt me! Uhaauh!”

      Ol’ Maude turned her head around to see who called her name and what the ruckus was about, then turned back again, and resumed leading her pack.



DAMAGE CONTROL



Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself

RAPE & ABUSE Happens!!!
Let’s move on to

Damage Control

It’s what happens, or what doesn’t happen, after the fact that determines the extent of mental damage. Damage Control is critical.

This is a dramatization of an ACTUAL EVENT that happened in Floyd County, Virginia on Feb. 15, 2010 to seven year old Sally (not her real name).

Sally answered the hard knocking on the front door. It was Joshua Lantz Cromer, and he was mad with hate and revenge against her father! He barged through the storm door and proceeded to beat her then raped her with foreign objects. All her begging, screaming, and pleading for help and mercy was in vain.

There hasn’t been a night pass by since that fateful day that Sally hasn’t woken up screaming, in a cold-sweat-drenched nightmare. She was terrified of being alone for even a minute, anywhere, at anytime. She was frightened of going to school, petrified to go outside to play, but mostly, she was horrified of just being at home. It happened right there, in the living room. She could still see the blood stain on the carpet, under the coffee table. Every time there was a knock on the door, her heart fluttered and her eyes darted around the room looking for escape routes.
     Joshua Lantz Cromer, violated and stripped away the sanctity and safety of her own home, among other things. If it could happen to her right here, in her own living room, without a reason or cause, then it could happen again, anywhere, at any time, and for no reason at all.

I Have A Dream

If it weren't impossible, I'd write a book, as a plan to follow, and then I would take each chapter and make it come to life.



THE SHELTER KIDS by Dale Davis

Setting,
Christina Virginia Freeman had just been offered the director position at the Animal Shelter under distressful circumstances. She had been doing volunteer work with pet therapy for years and had a hands-on history of knowing what worked with the animals. She had accumulated so many visionary ideas on how to make connections with people and animals and now that just might be a possibility.

First Paragraph,
     "Dad, I think I can do this, make this dream come true." Christina said.
     Joe Freeman, Christina's dad, cleared his throat and took a deep breath. "Then go for it girl. I've got your back, you know that, and Cathy and Buddy stand at your side." Silence hung in the air as Joe looked deep into Christina's eyes. With passion in every word, he spoke softly "If you don't do this now, you never will."
     Christina lifted her head assertively, looked directly at her father, and gritted her teeth. She paused for a moment as she realized the immensity of this lifetime obligation. "Okay then... It's do or die." She got up, gave her dad a kiss on the cheek then went to her lap top and formulated the plan.

Summary and Outline
Christina's first step was to expand the pet-therapy program to every hospital and retirement home that cared about their residents' zest for life. In the process, she found a wealth of experienced and eager cohorts with a lot of time on their hands.
     In the hospitals, the expanded pet therapy process began to have noticeable positive effects on those patients that had lost that spark of hope. The doctors began to see improvements and started doing some research on these phenomena, and the effects pet therapy had on speeding up recovery.
     Her daughter, sixteen year old Cathy Anne, focused on establishing communication networks with a website, blogs, web zines, E-Zines, newspaper articles, with community pleas for volunteers and advertising sponsors from local businesses, all with the help from retired professionals.
     Her fifteen year old son, Buddy, took charge of completing a dog-obedience and training course and with the guidance and mentoring skills of his granddad, he turned the shelter of homeless dogs into a training camp, complete with agility courses and sled-dog teams and even designed dog walking paths for the elderly with benches along the sides.
     Julia Roberts, seventeen, brought her horses up from W.Va to the farm and began horse riding and grooming schools along with special equine therapy programs for some of the kids with social-contact issues. She also put her black belt in Combat Hapkido to good use teaching kids Zen, The Art of Self-defense.
     Martha Grey, one of the residents at Green Acre's Happy Homes, donated the use of her abandoned family farm to the shelter.
     The TARP (Teens At Risk Program) took root and the Foxfire concepts of survival skills and self-sufficiency became a major theme providing much opportunity for the kids to realize their potential. They put their newly developed skills to good use providing the local community with fresh fruits and vegetables when in season. Grandma's old fashioned baked pies and cakes came back into vogue with the zucchini bread, made with Grey's secret hand me down recipes being the rave at many of the local stores and bakeries in the Tri-State area. Revenue generated from all their many goods and services provided a surplus. Not only did it pay all the bills, it also allotted each participating member a wage to sock away.
     TARP also generated many programs designed to evoke potential through interactions with the land, animals, and other needy kids. Teaching and mentoring became the preferred tools of learning (Observe it, Do it, Teach it), all under the guidance of other mentors, other teachers and other students. The kids earned merit badges as their individual skills improved in specific areas. The connection between empathy and self-perception was a key factor in stimulating desire within these programs and spawned many research studies, sponsored by government and private grants.
     Special interest groups were not permitted and there was no teaming up with friends or cliques. The focus was to build up the self, as an individual, with discovery of potential through interactions with the whole group, as a team effort, "One for all, and all for one." The trinity team duty rosters changed frequently and always included a mentor, a teacher, and a student. Everybody was required to participate in every aspect of every function, of every program at various times, even taking stints in the kitchen learning secret recipes, as well as sharing duties in management and participating in decision making skills. Community Mission Meetings were held daily with all issues put on the table for all to voice input on. Think military structure and design, with the primary purpose being to build up individual character for a lifetime.
     Eventually the program began to take root, grow, and overflow with willing volunteers and troubled kids from other areas. Satellite programs were set into motion to initiate similar programs in other towns with similar problems and plentiful resources at the animal shelters. It became a grass roots movement where faith, love, and support for each other became not just something to hope for, but something to get involved in.