Contribution

best job ever.

(07/09/2003; 12:14pm) - best job ever.


i look at animals, sick, well, insane, fighters, scared, nice...
cats, dogs, ferrets, rabbits, ducks...

i find them homes.

the whole place is a mess. the manhattan shelter is known for needing the most work. (as in, lets tear it down and start over) the AC's been broken for 10 days. it's been 90 degrees for what seems like always. they compensate with free coke and water... ice cold too. the guys have water fights. all of them, head sup.'s all the way down to the newest kennel kid. they're all 7 and running around screaming again.

i do grand rounds with a adoptions supervisor, and we find 7 sick dogs in the "healthy" adoptions room. the contagious room's full. he sighs and tells me how he hates this part of his job. he has to make room for the sick ones to get out of the healthy room. 7 animals have to be cleared, either through rescue or euthinasia from the sick ward by the next day. i nod and tell him that i'm so glad that it's his job and not mine.

the healthy and contagious rooms down stairs where things have either just come in or where babies that are too young to come upstairs is over flowing with kittens. that's not all true, we have a few cages left, but everything down there is carring something and you have to get them out as fast as you can, or the whole litter will die.

one mom has two kittens, less than 2 weeks old. eyes still shut, still wiggling furry worms with funny tiny stumps for legs. some lady comes in, she brings 6 kittens (all orange and calico), eyes all shut, all looking like dirty furry worms. we talk about it, and suggest that mom. next time i look in on her she's feeding 8 babies, now, instead of two. that's a LOT for one mom. i have two mom's and 10 cats total in my house and i'm going nuts, and they don't even nurse from me. tomorrow i'll have to see how many made it through the night.

in this situation, every baby, every dog, puppy, we pull out of that shelter is a rescue. through adoption, through foster, through transfer to other rescue facilities. and it's hard to watch the babies, so tiny and stumpy in front of you and know that if they were a little older they might make it on their own. but not now, and since everyone is having babies in the summer, there's no where to send them. Even I have too many in my little place...

it's just amazing.
and all these people, that make these choices, that care about these animals...
smile and have water fights, and remember how to be 7...
wouldn't you think it would make them hard?
how do you stay open and kill?
how do you make big kid desicions and not forget how to be little?

i absolutly love my job.
i love it.
every day i do a good thing.
it's so bad ass, even if my shoes do stink.