Last week I was spraying weeds, and at one point I noticed something move in a weedy area along our fence. I glanced back - after having sprayed there - and saw that it was a little bird. It was old enough to move about, but couldn't yet fly... and I had just sprayed it with weed killer. I was immediately bummed. And it was like he was looking up at me wanting to say, "Why did you do that to me?" So I got the garden hose out and thought I would try to spray it off with water. Of course, when I sprayed water on the poor thing it just knocked it over. Then the bird got all flustered. So I sprayed it a little bit, and just left it alone. I was sad for the rest of the night.
And like that wasn't bad enough, then the other day I was coming home from Fort Wayne. I was on Smith Road just south of the dump, where that little church sits. I noticed something in the middle of my lane, and the cars in front of me kept swerving around it. It was raining fairly steady and I couldn't see what it was until I got almost to it, and I noticed it was moving as cars went by. Man... it was a young dog. I don't know if it had been hit or what, but it was laying in the road and was able to hold its head up, and it just looked at each car as it drove past. I felt like the worlds biggest clod driving past. I don't know what I could have done, but I should have done SOMETHING. It had THE saddest look on its face, and was dripping wet...
Stuff like that completely ruins my day. I still feel rotten about it. Sigh...
6 comments:
You are right! Those are sad events.
Dan,
You are not alone. I had a similar event a few weeks ago (bunny, not bird - and I killed it by accident). I've wept for hitting a bird with the car when there was absolutely nothing I could do to avoid it (highway, boxed in by heavy traffic, didn't even see it until it hit my windshield).
It's sad.
My thinking is to give it its due amount of grief and then put it out of your mind, forever. Otherwise life is just way too hard, because there's stuff like this happening all the time, every day, if not to you then to someone you know.
But I hear you, and I understand.
Life in a fallen world is not always fun. A few years ago I pulled off the road twice in one summer to help animals stranded in the middle of a highway. Both times as I got out of my car I watched them be run over and killed. And here's the kicker: I'm fairly sure that people ran over them as a direct result of my being there--probably through paying so much attention to me parked at the edge of the road that they didn't pay attention to the animal they ran over when swerving out to avoid me.
In short, even stopping to help may not help, so don't be too hard on Danno.
Peace.
One time I hit a raccoon and when I looked back it wasn't dead but I couldn't face going back and running over it again. I cried - yup.
Sucks.
Hey Dan could you send me your blog password so I can delete this depressing stuff that's ruining my day?
Well, I can't say that I'm glad I'm not alone... but I appreciate you sharing in my agony.
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