i wonder...

what is it about me that chooses to define myself by rescuing animals?

it is not just because i am drawn to them, like a moth to the flame..if this was all that it was, i would simply have pets.
it is not that i am a bleeding heart either, feeling sorry for the helpless and weak...if this was the case, i would be overwhelmed by all of their needs.

i think it is something different..i think i identify with them. i see my own failings and weakness. i see my own vulnerability, my own broken-ness.

i see these animals wrecked and destroyed, abandoned and betrayed..unwanted.... simply because they are flawed.

and it pisses me off.

i am not perfect..i am not anyone's idyllic dream and i have true value and so do they.

we place value on who we are, what we have, what we have done. but we don't value just being a broken nothing or no one.

i have gotten good value mileage out of being carol at saints....but no one values me for being old, wrecked, stupid and yes sometimes a bitch.
and that is a shame because that really is the best parts of me. those are the things that make living for me a battle in survival...that (so far) i win every day.

i was thinking about odie, jesse, phoebe, puff daddy and chance and how such biting, beastly dickheads who are so difficult to live with are such incredibly lovable creatures when they are so bad. how does the dark side of them get overshadowed by their light?

it is because they have despite themselves.... survived. and they were lucky enough to find a place where the not so great parts of them are valued as much as the rest.

if saints has done one single good thing for the animals here...it is that we have convinced the broken that they really are whole.

maybe that is why i choose to define myself by rescuing them. maybe that gift that i give them gives the same gift to me in the end.