I went to Kelly Nolan’s house yesterday to meet her two surviving puppies and get a photo of them. They look pretty sweet, as puppies do. Kelly wanted me to thank you all again for your generous help in paying off her $1,300 veterinary bill.
I met Zoey, the puppies sweet mother. Mom and puppies are doing well.
When Kelly adopted Zoe, she didn’t know she was pregnant. From the first, the birth went badly. Kelly lost three puppies and saved two, and Zoey as well. Kelly felt she had no choice but to do everything possible to save the dog and some of her babies.
People on the blog sent enough money to cover Kelly’s costs in two or three days, it was an amazing demonstration of the goodness of people when given the chance. A lot of you know what it’s like to save an animal you love and run up some big bills in the process.
You’ve been in Kelly’s shoes.
I’ve been taken photos of Kelly and putting them up on the blog for months now. She works part-time at Foggy Notions, known locally as The Bog. She waits tables, ferries food, tends the bar. She has one of the most beautiful and natural smiles I’ve ever seen.
She is a devoted mother and wife and daughter and sister. Kelly is a strong woman. Many people flinch or grimace when they see a camera, strong women looked the camera in the eye and dare me to touch the shutter. Kelly never blinks or flinches at the camera, and she reminds me that the camera does not lie.
The camera judges people truthfully and without guile. After a few visits to the Bog, it felt as if Kelly were my friend, not just taking orders. I imagine that’s true for a lot of people.
Life can be scarring and disappointing, but Kelly handles life the same way she handles her difficult job: with grace. In that way, she is an inspiration to me and to others.
These are painful times in our country, there is much anger and hurt and cruelty. Kelly reminds me to think of the small acts of good and mercy, of doing things that are good.
This one certainly felt good, and I thank you very good people from all over the country who stepped outside of yourselves and wrote all those letters and sent all those checks and folded all those paper bills into envelopes and sent them along to Kelly.
You did good and you lit some candles on some dark days.
Those of us who live and work and love and sometimes rescue animals are often drawn into what I call the God Business of the animal world, the boundary and perspective and ethical issues that come whenever one living thing presumes to rescue another living thing, in the process challenging the very laws of nature, and perhaps, even of their God.
As some of you know, I’ve been taking photographs of a nest of Phoebe chicks newborn in a nest in an eave of Maria’s studio. This morning, when Maria went outside, she found two of the three chicks were dead, a third, covered in mites and small worms was barely alive.
Life. Death. Life. One comes with the other, if I can’t accept and understand one, I can’t accept the very nature of life itself. And this is the issue that comes up for me so often when it comes to animal rescue. Baby birds in nests rarely, if ever, can be saved by non-professional human beings.
Without thinking, I found myself slipping across a boundary I know better than for me to cross. I got on the phone. What do baby birds eat? How do I feed it to them? Maria picked up the chick in a cloth, we started feeding it maple water, then crushed cheerios – things one vet friend and a farmer told me to try.
Both said it was nearly impossible to save a sick or stricken chick. The mother Phoebe, who had hovered for days near the nest, was nowhere to be seen. It appeared as if some disease had stricken these babies.
We spent a frantic half-hour rushing around, trying one thing, trying another, trying to clean the bird, cheered when he opened his beak and took some food. We went up and down, drawn by hubris and human emotions into the glory and power of being God.
My head was spinning. Where could I get a dropper? What ingredients would I need to buy? What websites could I find online?
And then, at one point, Maria turned and looked at me and we both shook our heads. This was not where we wanted to go, we pulled ourselves back across the boundary of the real live of real animals, of nature and it’s own laws.
We deal with death all the time – dogs, donkeys, lambs, ewes, bears, deer, raccoons, possums, skunks, moles and mice.
This one seemed different, at least at first. Babies are so helpless, they touch the deepest parts of us when they struggle.
We pulled ourselves back into the realm we know well. The baby was barely alive. The worms and parasites were already doing their work. Maria handed the bird to me. I think we should kill it, she said. She is plenty tough, but there are some things she can’t do, and many things I can’t do.
This was one I could do.
I took the baby bird out back and gave it a quick and merciful death, as I perhaps should have done from the first. A week-old bird with no mother, covered in mites and worms deserves mercy and compassion, not human projections of mercy and compassion.
Maria went out back and buried the birds, and I thought about this also. When an animal dies on our farm – and we have lost many, as almost anyone who lives with animals knows,we return it to nature. We leave it for the worms and coyotes and vultures and foxes and owls and crows.
She said she really was thinking of the burial because the bird was covered in mites, perhaps even maggots. She wanted them underground. That made sense.
Baby birds do not need the rituals of human beings, I believe, they are not conscious of death and its traditions.
But we had both slipped, however briefly into that other realm. And then grounded ourselves. Still, it was upsetting, seeing the small creature opening its mouth, hungry for food, abandoned in the nest and dying. There were lots of reasons for that to touch each of us, and deeply.
I do not ever tell other people what to do or feel and animal rescue is a powerful thing, an emotional quagmire, an ethical morass, a personal and individual experience. I know many people who handle it well, and many people who lose all perspective and get lost in it.
It takes work and thought. The more we know and face ourselves, the better we can handle it.
Countless animals struggle and die out of our sight and consciousness, that is the nature of their real lives. We cannot save them all, nor should we try. It is not up to us to set the balance of nature or disrupt it. Sometimes we can help, sometimes we can’t.
The baby Phoebe reminded me that the ethics of animal rescue are complex. I respect nature and it’s laws and ways. I try not to project my own stories and needs and emotions onto helpless and dependent creatures. And I remember always, the boundaries. To think of them, know what they are for me, and honor them.
When dealing with animals, I remember always ,that I am not God, and I do not wish to play God.
Life. Death. Life. Death is as much a part of life as birth and rebirth.
Sometimes we need to honor death as we need to honor life. By standing back and bowing our heads to it. We do not have miracles in our kits.
