The Cruelty of Abandonment Date Thursday, April 25, 2024 - 09:34 PM PST Topic Experiences I named him Waylan Jennings, because he was a Highwayman. Specifically Highway 410 that runs from Puyallup, Wa east all the way up and over the Pass in Snoqualmie. He was five weeks old, and came bursting from the grass on the side of this increasingly busy stretch of two-lane blacktop to chase a bicyclist. I saw him from the corner of my eye as we passed, and yelled for the car to be stopped, to which my husband obliged. I bailed out before it had even coasted to a stop, and approached the bicyclist at a run, gasping "Is that your kitten?" He held up the ragged fluff of black, held him out to me and said "He looks like he's yours." "They all are, eventually" I replied. With no second thought, we finished the two minute remaining trip to my house, which happens to sit on this wretched stretch of accident causing road, with a yowling, terrified, half starved and filthy little man in my lap. This dangerous highway is also a popular dumping ground for unwanted and abandoned animals, most of whom are killed by speeding uncaring motorists shortly after they are left to fend for themselves amongst the hawks, eagles, coyotes and dogs. "We'll find him a home" I told to my husband. "We won't keep him, we'll find him a home" I told to myself. After naming my Highwayman Waylan. First, he was Willie Nelson, but he didn't look much like a Willie to me. He was fed, he was washed. He then broke my heart over and over as his fear subsided and his need to fill starved love surfaced. He fought to get away from me in the car, even after he had seen a passing human and run desperately after in hopes of something even he might not have understood. A remembered kind hand, a warm place to sleep, a feeling of safety, or a full stomach he associated with a biped of any sort in his short 5 weeks of life. I was doing dishes, thinking him asleep on the couch, when I found him climbing my leg and purring loud enough for me to feel it through my jeans. I thought "who, what kind of person, could leave this little thing out to starve? To sleep in the cold? To fend for himself? Who could turn away this need to be safe, and loved by SOMETHING. Who couldn't just find him a HOME?!" Yes, I'm overdramatic, but in that moment with him climbing my leg I HATED whoever had left him alongside the road like trash. I HATED them. And then I started to think about all the animals I've had in my life that came off that same road or the roads near it. Most of our pets were strays, I think I've only bought a cat or dog twice in my life. They all came to us through need and chance. The rack of bones mutt with the dislocated hip from being hit by a car that wandered onto our property and cowered in the bushes until the smell of food brought her out. Even 6 years later, you couldn't sweep or raise your voice without her running off to hide, afraid of what the broom or a loud voice could be the beginning of (and I'm sure she knew). The gangly giant mix breed found in a paper sack with his sister on a back road near my 4-H leader's house. The kitten in the parkinglot of Fred Meyer's when I was 18. The himalayan my dad found in a rock quarry near Buckley, starving to death. The calico cat almost made deaf from ear mites my sister found in covington. The seeming endless string of abandonment my family took in. Where do they come from? Somewhere, sometime, someone opted to dump them to die than putting a FREE AD in a local paper, a poster at a grocery store, a notice on a pet adoption site. FOR FREE. Whenever I hear the phrase "We might have to go take a ride with the cat/dog" my blood just boils. What gives you the right to take an animal you've made dependent on yourself and DUMP them into misery's hands? To take away their feeling of saftey, territory, and happiness? Do you honestly think that "instinct" will override the feelings of lonliness, of loss, of fear when the night closes, the cars race by, and the larger more predatory animals come prowling? When the hunger sets in and they've never had to hunt for a meal in their lives? Will you sing "born free" as they're mowed down on the highway? Or are picked off by a larger animal? Or finally starve to death? You can't get on the fucking internet and FIND a "no kill" shelter or adoption website or rescue agency? You can't place an add in the fucking paper? But you can drive an hour out of your way to drop them off so there's NO CHANCE they can find you again? If I were to meet one of these people......I'd be in jail right now. You lazy sons of whores. You uncaring selfish wastes of skin. HOW DARE YOU. I had Waylan for 24 hours. I gave him the warm home, full stomach, clean fur, and soft bed that some uncaring prick denied him. I gave him that for 24 hours, and then I gave him away. And I cried as hard as if I'd lost him after a lifetime with him. I told the woman that his name was Waylan, and that he seemed to like that name best. A lot better than Willie. And when she said "stop crying baby, I'm your new mommy now" I cried harder in my head than ever. I'm his mother, and I always will be. I'd keep you all if I could. This article comes from Shmeng http://www.shmeng.com/ The URL for this story is: http://www.shmeng.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=719