Some things are just meant to be and there is no other explanation.
February 2003
The Biggest Gift
It was a miserably hot day on August 18th, 2002. My husband, Mark and I had been to church and then to the funeral home to pay respects to the family of a co-worker, whose father had past away. It was hot, humid and sunny and I couldn’t wait to get home to take off the dress and heels I had worn all day.
We live in a rural community on a winding country road. We know nearly everyone and they know us. So it was strange that we came across a little girl that nobody seemed to have seen before.
She was lying in the road... half her body off in the weeds and her little head on the hot pavement. She wasn’t moving as we rounded the curve and started down the hill, but I caught a glimpse of a scrappy, dirty “dead” animal. Poor little groundhog or possum that had been hit by a car. But wait! It raised its head to look at us as we passed by. One last desperate attempt to get attention before dying there in the dirt and heat.
I almost yelled when I said, “what was that? Oh my gosh, that was a dog…stop the car!” When the car kept rolling and Mark was protesting “Now, Mendy…” I yelled louder, “STOP…. STOP this car now!” and then I began to open the door with the vehicle still moving. He finally gave in and started backing up. A dangerous spot to be doing this had another car come around the curve and upon us. I jumped out and started toward the little animal that was hardly recognizable as a canine.
Mark warned me that it might not be a safe thing to be doing. “You better be careful, you don’t know this animal and it might bite you!” I ignored him and told him to pop open the trunk. There...for some unknown reason at the time (but now I know it was fate)...I had a laundry basket and a clean sheet. I got them out and went toward the pitiful little dog. As I approached, she lifted her little head some and the saddest brown eyes met mine. She looked as if she had been crying and I am sure she had. She was wet and dirty and her fur was matted and full of burrs and tangled with small sticks and all kinds of remnants from the woods. Her tiny little paws were bleeding from the hot pavement and her travels.
I wrapped the sheet around her battered little body and lifted her gently into the basket, and she grunted a little so I knew it had hurt her. I then put the basket on the back seat. She smelled awful!
We drove the ½ mile home and I got her out and sat the basket on the ground. All the other animals were curious and came around to sniff and see what I had brought them. I tried to get her to eat and she drank some water but was too weak to eat anything. I got out the water hose and started to bathe her while Mark was cleaning out the long-empty dog pen. The last time it was used was by Jake, our Retriever/Boxer mix that had died 8 months earlier. We had lost 3 dogs in the previous 8 months and that is one of the reasons Mark was against stopping to pick up a stray. We’d had a painful time and had been grieving the loss of our dogs Remo, Jake, and Heather.
After the little waif of a dog was clean and a little more comfortable, I put her in the pen to rest in the doghouse. She was there for several days before she started to walk around. I spent every free moment down there with her, petting her, feeding her, talking to her and trying to sooth her sad little soul. I had called the vet and they had told me what to do for her and then when she was a little stronger, 3 days later, I took her to the vet to have her checked.
They estimated her age at 2-3 years old, but she appeared much older, probably because she’d had a rough life. Her teeth were worn down and broken, her ears and body had been infested with fleas and mites for so long that the infection was unbearable to smell. Her ears were so swollen, the vet said she would never have normal ear canals again. Her fur had been torn out in spots and was starting to grow back in. After her bath, I’d had to cut many sections out because it was so matted it was not brushable. She was definitely blind in one eye and had cataracts starting on the other. Her belly was swollen from malnutrition. The pads of her feet were damaged from the hot pavement she was on. Her chin and around her mouth was scarred so badly that she flinched every time we would touch that area. The vet gave her the required shots and antibiotics and we set an appointment to have her spayed. It seemed she had been a new mother not long before we found her. Was that the reason she had been abandoned? And maybe with her babies, who had died along the way?
She went without a name for several days and then Mark (who had been reluctant at first to even have her around) said to me, “I went down to feed Ginger and she seems to be doing better”. “Ginger?” I said…. “When did she get a name?” as I smiled to myself that he had warmed up to the idea of another baby to raise. He said he thought it was fitting that a dog that had such a hard life in the beginning deserved a good name and Ginger seemed a classy name to him. So Ginger she became.
So how and where did this little dog come from? Had someone thrown her from a moving vehicle? Had she traveled by foot through the woods and paved roads on her own? Had she lost her way and was trying to find her way back to a wonderful home? Was she dropped off with her puppies because they were all unwanted? We will never know. And if someone came to me now and said “that is my dog” I would have to say, “No, I don’t think so!”
Our Heather had died of heat exhaustion on July 2nd and on August 18th we had found this wonderful little girl who needed our love as much as we needed hers. I said then…and I will always say…that God gave her to me. He made her appear from nowhere and she was in the right place at the right time just as we were passing by. It was meant to be and I will always be grateful for that gift.
Today Ginger is a happy, healthy terrier-poodle mix that rules the house. She is little but she is mighty. And the older, bigger dogs respect that deep growl when she shows her teeth and takes charge! She jumps up on us and barks her little high-pitched yap when we come home and she begs to go for a run beside the 4-wheeler or a ride in the car. She is playful and happy and healthy. And now, less than a year later, I am so in love with this little girl that I cannot remember life without her!
And so now I know…the biggest gifts do come in the smallest packages.
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I’ve encountered many non-human creatures on my life’s journey.
I have found each and every one of these animals to be a unique and wondrous being.
Animals have truly brought fullness to my life. Some of them have also brought de
February 2003
