Of Course...

Of course I finally make a point of going to bed at a reasonable hour tonight and I can't sleep.

My mind is WIDE AWAKE.

I've made a LOT of mistakes in my life. I feel a LOT of guilt about a lot of things, some reasonable, some not.

I miss my dogs incredibly. I miss all the animals I've had.

My apartment complex is now allowing MY BUILDING to have SMALL dogs.

I had a HUGE loss a few years back. EVERYTHING I loved and cared about was taken from me. Hey, I wasn't the worst person in the world, but I don't blame her for leaving. We weren't that close, not for two people living together.

My heart's been pretty closed off to taking care of another animal since then. I have opened it some to caring for animals, but not of my own, though I do feel the void and wish to fill it. I keep thinking about the breeders D'Argo and Shere Khan came from and how I would love to go through them again for a Great Dane, but also I would love to rescue a Great Dane as well.

I'm not closed off to other dogs by far. You see, that part isn't about the new animals in my life. It's about denial of the ones that were in my life not being there anymore.

I gave up my first dog only a few months after I had her. She was part wolf, part husky, from my sister's dog, Apache. I'm strict about what my animals eat and the care for them. And my parents, especially my mom, do as they please. And I find that EXTREMELY disrespectful. Living with them at the time, I was fairly young, between knowing that they would contribute to making her unhealthy, and my mom convincing me that it was best not to have her, I gave her to someone that she worked with that had a dog already that was part wolf.

It was a bit hard, but I knew it was the right thing to do? She went with him just fine, I watched through the window, until they got to his truck and she just struggled and didn't want to go in. We spent every moment together for that short time we had together. I wanted to run outside and take her back, but I did nothing. I hated seeing her struggling not to get in that truck.

I've got a TON of other guilt about my animals in me, everything from feeling guilty about their deaths, to feeling like I didn't do the right things for them, to realizing some were better off without me.

So my apartment complex is allowing small dogs in this building, which is wonderful. It's just a little bit of something that makes it feel a little bit more like an actual home, even if I'm not in a position to have a dog of my own right now. It still feels nice knowing that I don't HAVE TO buy a house in order to have a dog. I'm not much on small dogs, but it's something.

I've been thinking about him more and more. I'm definitely thinking about him a TON tonight. It's so weird too. I mean, I'm still building up the scars over my heart and all that when it comes to animals. I've only seen him in person really once, but there is just something about this dog Houma over at Pets Alive. He's got the most INCREDIBLE scar all down his back, and all I see is beauty.

So of course I'm transferring money over to my PayPal account and I want to help sponsor him (He's been going through SO MUCH lately). I know the money's not much, but at least it's a little bit more than they had before.

Then I started thinking, "Oh my god! With everything that's been going on with him, so many people are finding out about his story. There's no way he's going to be there for very long once everything's going smooth." And that's good, good for him, upsetting as hell for me right now. Now being able to have a "SMALL" dog? isn't good enough. Because I know the dog I want. And I STILL can't have him.

Dean Koontz basically said, when you get a dog, it's the most pure form of selflessness there is. The most pure love, all that. You take in a dog, open up your home and your heart to it KNOWING, in most cases, that it will die long before you do.

I guess I'm still waiting for that time when I actually get to that point. I had Egypt for under a year. She had to be put to sleep. She spent the rest of her life with me. And I always feel her inside of me. My three boys and even my girl from years ago, I miss them and love them, and wonder what ever happened with them and if they're still alive - D'Argo showed that he'd need hip surgery at some point in his life - but I still feel that in part, at times, they were mine at one point, but the reality of it is they turned into someone else's. Egypt was with me in the winter of her life, but with me until the very end.

I've lost more that I've opened my heart to than handfuls of people experience in their lives. Plenty of it was my own doing.

I'd just like to get it right some day.

I am trying to believe.