Ash Wednesday and Good-Bye to Boots

Today is Ash Wednesday that marks the beginning of Lent. I'd be interested to hear from you, who observe Lent, what you are giving up during that season? I'm not into candy, junkfood, cigarettes or booz, but I am a very bad procrastinator. I've decided to make an honest effort, every day, to do what I have set out to do. That means either setting my goals smaller - and therefore more obtainable - or doing/finishing what I intended to. This is also one of my New Year's resolutions, including losing weight, but that's another story.

I also will try to be more charitable in terms of sharing my time - and being more patient - with people, including those that I'm not particularly fond of. As I have no monitary items to give, other than my crochet work, I have no cash or resources to offer, I can give only my crocheted work, my time and offer people rides in my vehicle as long as they can pay for the gas.

On a sad note, one of my neighbors (and friend) discovered Boots dead on the lawn near my apartment this morning. She had her ex-husband pick him up and bury him. I didn't go out to see Boots. I was too upset. I just learned from the Site Manager that at 1:30 am last night, my immediate next-door neighbor (the difficult one, who stays up all night talking on the phone) saw two of the big dogs that have been roaming our neighborhood at night, going at it with Boots and pulling him, one on each end, till he was dead. I was told that he wasn't mauled and aside from a little blood on his hind quarters, looked pretty much intact. Apparently these dogs are trained hunting dogs who know exactly how to kill game (something I do not ever want to witness.) To me hunting is just another word for murder. I'm somewhat miffed at my neighbor for not calling me, and/or the law, so we could have tried to stop it, rather than just watching it happen. Heck, she keeps me up all hours of the night with her midnight phone calls, why not when it was so important? I, and the apartment manager, suspect the reason she didn't call me is because she wanted the cat dead. She makes no secret of disliking animals, especially cats and dogs, because she's allergic to them. She's allergic to everything! If it were up to her, all the trees would be cut down and all animals detroyed and then she'd probably find something else she needed to get rid of because she's allergic to it. She is one of those selfish people that thinks the world revolves around only her. Please understand that I'm not making light of people with allergies. I have them too, but I try not to impose my afflictions onto others, man or beast. Poor Bootsie did not deserve to die like that. He was a smart cat. The dogs must've surprised and cornered him before he got a chance to climb up a tree (he had all his claws.) This will take me a while to get over. My stomach is in knots and God help me to curb my tounge next time I see my neighbor wanting to talk to me about "her" problems. If you removed the words "I, Me and Mine" out of the English Dictionary, she would not be able to carry on a conversation.

Anyway, the Apartment Manager said she will talk to our local Animal Control person about what happened and see if he can put a stop to these marauding killer dogs. I went outside before in the middle of the night to shoo one of them away from my front porch. It only caused him to turn around to bark at me defiantly. I am generally not afraid of dogs, but I went back inside just in case. Please understand, I love all animals, especially dogs, but I have zero tolerance towards violence, aggressive and dangerous so called "pets" and people who practice irresponsible pet ownership. I know it's not the dogs' fault (after all Gizzy hates cats too, but he's only 10 lbs. and always under my supervision. I'm thankful he's so little, because if he were a full-sized dog, I'm not sure I could handle or keep him. He's a little stinker sometimes.)  It's the owners' responsibility to keep their animals contained.

Call me paranoid, but I would not be a bit surprised if someone purposely put these people up to allowing their dogs to kill our community cats, because a lot of people hate them around. It would be so typical for this place!

My mind keeps wandering to last night when I saw him and I keep thinking that I should have insisted that Boots would come in, but it was going to happen sooner or later as long as those dogs are allowed to terrorize our neighborhood at night. Of course, I can't help but thinking about "if only's" and "I should have's" ...but it is what it is!

I also learned that one of my further down neighbor's (on the other set of buildings a few feet down) saw one of her "community cats" (strays) all bloodied and now he's gone. He was the blind one that slept on her front porch, because he fell victim to someone's evil doings with the spray bottle (we have our suspicions) - plus two other cats are missing.  This is definietely not an animal friendly neighborhood and I will move away from here just as soon as I am financially able. Meanwhile, I will have absolutely nothing to do with anyone else (except the three ladies that help feed the strays.) I'm crawling into my hole and bury my head (in my yarn) till I can move away from here. My heart can't take this anymore!

Sorry, guys, I normally don't open up like this, but this is the final straw! I have swallowed a lot of injustice here, but have been trying very hard to concentrate on positive things (and will continue to do so) because life is too short to be miserable, but I think I have finally been beat up by this neighborhood and the mentality of the people around me. I give up!
God is really testing me. I promised to be nicer and more patient with "difficult to love" people and my neighbor falls in that category. Now that I know she could have prevented Bootsie's death (or at least tried to) it will be doubly difficult for me to follow through with my promise.

May you rest in peace Bootsie, my sweet feline friend. You had to find your home another way - - -

I will never forget you!