..... only 1 sixth of our average lifespan.
......
That's always in the back of my mind. If/when my feline friends go before me, I know I'll be shattered.
yeah
but then again im at the age i may outlive my feline friends and i have made plans for their care if/when we pass before they do. and at the point where getting a new kitten/pup would almost be a disservice to them really. figure will be adopting older pets from here on out.
There are frequently a whole hell of a lot of older pets in need of homes.. that is kind of a sad dynamic in the pet space. because so many people like the puppies and the kittens, but after one or two years they lose interest or at least the market seems to be for the young ones.
You will be doing a great service to focus on adopting older pets because those are the ones that tend to be euthanized if a home cannot be found in a fairly prompt timeline.
I felt really bad a year ago because I was trying to give away my then two year old dog (looked very similar to the Dude's dog - except maybe a little lighter... so something in the 14kilo/30 lbs range).... and it was very stressful for me to go through such process, and I am not sure if the dog noticed it.. but there were some points in which I was exploring the possibility of having a kind of foster care (saying they only work with "no kill" shelters) as a kind of back up plan in the event that I could not find a home for the dog, yet even with that I kept thinking that I could not bear to leave my dog in such a impersonal shelter kind of a situation.. even though some of the foster persons that I screened seemed to be very caring people, but they could not really guarantee me that they would spend time with my dog or even assure that my dog would get adequate daily attention... some of them had something like 10 dogs under their care at any one time..
So largely I spent nearly two months advertising and cajoling various friends and relatives, and I had a few false starts, and so many people said that they just loved my dog.. but could not take her for x, y, z reason and I even discovered some of them around the same time taking in puppies.. so it seemed a bit hypocritical, and other kinds of contradictory behaviors...
I even had some people who had dogs that were way the fuck out of control, and my dog in comparison to their dogs was very obedient..
Yeah, my dog had a lot of energy, but if I yelled at her about not doing certain things or even instructed her to go do and to stay in another spot.. she was very obedient.. including that for two years, I had been walking her on about a daily basis, so even if we were in a unleashed situation, she would stop at the street and wait for me to tell her when she could cross the street and even if I kept walking, she would wait and wait and wait for the command that she could join me. In so many ways, such an amazing dog, and so it was really causing me suffering to figure out placement for her.
So, even though I had several false starts - and I even rejected a few requests for people to take her because I was uncomfortable with the whole situation.. but then one day, I had one of my highschool friends message me about his friend who was looking for a dog that was already trained.. like mine, and so when I got in contact with with the husband and wife, and went to visit the location with just the wife there and the husband was on facetime because he was out of town on a trip, and I saw that they had a newborn (like maybe a month or two old) a toddler (like maybe a little less than 2 years old) and then some extended family members, and they kept saying that they did not want a puppy, but they want an already trained dog. They had a house and a yard and even some extended family with farm areas (and animals)... so I though those were all great aspects.
One of the funny parts was that the while I was talking with the wife, her 2 year old kept pulling on my dogs hair and tail and just laughing and laughing.. You know the way kids get, and I was thinking that my dog is really friendly, but it might not be a great idea to keep pulling her hair and her tail.. and the mom just acted like it was not any kind of big deal... so it is funny that the dog would have to get used to some of those new family dynamics, and it was really easy for me to feel that I was leaving the dog in good hands, even though at the same time it was quite sad for me too... I mean two years of having a dog to yell at, and the dog was such a great pal to listen to much of what I said.. even though in the very beginning, the dog did not listen very well.. there is a kind of great feeling to have that kind of companionship.. and also the energy of the dog too.. when running around and going on walks and even if we went to some new situation that involved farm animals, or various kinds of streams of water, or lakes or even we had gone to the ocean too.. and sometimes the dog would act quite strange in the new situation, like being scared of the waves of the ocean.. or even not sure about how to deal with the creek of water.. and so through the interaction, there was learning involved regarding how to deal with those situations, and there was appreciation that the dog was learning how to deal with some of those new situations (but also she had her own character too).. .and also when we had been staying in places while traveling.. good to have a guard dog too, when in a new place she might take a few hours getting used to the place and to the sounds, so she even got used to notifying me if there were some strange sounds.. even though she did not bark very much.. but sometimes she would.. and that would cause me to be startled.. since she was not really a regular barker. ... so all good and fun.. all good and fun.. and sad too when the dog is no longer around.
I frequently wondered what it would be like if my dog had gotten run over by a car or something like that while she was under my care or while we were going on our walks.. When we were traveling, sometimes there would be some quite crazy drivers and weird streets, and usually she got used to it.. but sometimes I would wonder if I was allowing her too much freedom when I sometimes would walk in those situations without a leash.. until I realized that the whole situation was too congested and confusing and the dog deserved a leash..
Would have been a crazy feeling for the dog to get injured in a severe way if we were walking like that and if I felt that I was responsible for it... I recall going on walks sometimes, and some stray dogs would join us.. sometimes friendly and sometimes not so friendly.. .. and it was very uncomfortable to see the stray dogs.. because I would tell my dog to stop or to go when we arrived at the street crossings, but sometimes those stray dogs would not really seem to have very good discipline like my dog, and frequently I would worry that I may end up seeing the death of one of those stray dogs.. but luckily that did not happen during those couple of years that we were going on those walks.
