Love of all life -Wildlife Wednesday

Sitting at my computer late this evening, when I usually would have a blog posted, I find that I'm having a hard time focusing on what I want to say. I had originally intended to write about the Big Cats, or Birds of Prey, or the Wolf population. However I feel compelled to write about the recent posts I've have read on the popular social media page facebook.

As you read my blog, you will begin to understand my love and passion for wildlife, hence the day dedicated to just this topic.

Every day I read a post, article or other informative piece of information regarding the plight of our wilderness. Tonight I read how children tortured a small defenceless puppy and it brought me to tears. Tears to the point of sobbing at such horrific abuse, and the torment this sweet baby endured.

I will never understand how the brain develops the ability to inflict such torture, pain and complete lack of empathy for another living creature.


This post isn't intended to educate, or give factual information. This post is to express and evoke a sense of emotion for creatures other than ourselves.

Look into the eyes of your pet. See the life. See the personality. Our fur babies have personalities, attitudes, unique behaviours that make them who they are. Anyone with a pet knows this.

Feel the love. Feel the connection. Look into their eyes and see the life, the profound love they have for their human. The sheer joy they express when you open the door after coming home from work, when they can't seem to get enough of you and follow you from room to room, happy you're there.

Hear their heartbeat when you lay your head on their chest, the life other than your own. Feel their soul when you rest your face on their body, the knowledge that another creature is breathing, thinking, existing that you didn't create. This is a member of your family, a sacred being, a special creature your chose to be part of a special bond, your Family. Nothing is more sacred than the love shared among family.

Now, imagine this life broken. Legs snapped. Fur burned. Head battered and bloody. Tail ripped from their body, or limp and dangling on the ground. Their fearful eyes crying, not understanding why. Not understanding what they did to deserve the brutality.

Imagine this poor defenseless creature stuffed into a garbage bag, knot securely tightened, sitting in the back seat of a car until it is thrown out the window into the ditch, like the trash. Unwanted garbage that no one will miss, laying in the grass, starving to death, crying for it's Mommy, screaming out of fear. Imagine the horror this being is experiencing, not knowing what is going on, with no Mommy or Daddy to protect it, unable to breath. Vivid and horrific, right?

This is happening. Children are torturing pets, domestic animals for enjoyment! And not just children, adults too.

Helpless, defenseless creatures often become the victims of human games. From lighting a kitten on fire, to throwing one out the car window and worse. Whatever you can imagine is happening.

It is the job of the adult to instill the love and care for Mother Nature in the next generation. While one may feel wildlife is not as important as humans, there must also be the realization that wildlife is here for a reason, if only to make people empathetic to life other than their own.

I often think of the creatures living a fearful existence, and hope they either leave their world of torture sooner than later, or that somehow, someway, they will be saved. No life deserves to suffer. No life deserves to live in fear. No life deserves to experience brutality. Ever.

I like to think that while this is my opinion, I'm not alone in my beliefs. I hope there are more people with the desire to protect life rather than destroy it for the "enjoyment" they think it brings. And in fact, there is no enjoyment, just behaviours indicative of deranged and sociopathic individuals.

After all, we are all Mother Nature's Heroes, all deserving of life, together.

Miscellaneous Mondays first edition -In Memoriam

It's been 2 weeks since I held in my hands a sweet baby Robin. It's been 2 weeks since this baby took its last breath. It's been 2 weeks since I watched life leave and I can still see its face as its mouth stopped breathing and its eyes closed one last time.

Two weeks ago this past Sunday, yesterday, I was in the living room watching my 2 fur babies stare out the patio doors at a young Robin hopping around our backyard.

The baby had lost its baby fluff on the top of its head but still had the young feathers on its breast. Not an adult, but not a fledgling anymore.

I went about my work when only a few short minutes later I heard a thump on the patio window. I knew what this meant. When I walked to the door and looked outside, there was no bird at the step, or anywhere on the ground. Hoping the bird had hit the window and continued flying, I thought it best if I checked in between the step and container on the ground beside it.

There it was. The young Robin sprawled out, its left wing spread off to the side, its head tilted left, its mouth opening and closing as it tried to catch its breath.

I carefully picked it up and thankfully its wing folded back in properly. It seemed to have movement in its head as it bobbed it around a bit.

I gently placed it on the ground so it could catch its breath and recover. As I watched it breathing, I thought to check if it had any strength in its legs, and to make sure it could breathe properly.

No strength in the legs. This was not a good sign. I began to tell it to live, please not to go. I rubbed its chest. Its breathing slowed. Its eyes slowly started to close. Then it went home.

The baby is now on the next journey, its body resting on the densely covered ground among the vines.

I cried. I broke down and sobbed for hours. I had held a life and watched as it left this world and went on the next.

We did some errands that day instead of our original plans and I met a wonderful lady who shared my sadness. Everything happens for a reason. The baby was meant to go home that day, and I was blessed and honoured to be the person to comfort it as it passed on.

Baby birds often fly into windows, this isn't unusual. Acknowledging this life as precious and sharing this story allows me to honour its memory and teach others all life is important.

After all, we are all Mother Nature's Heroes, all deserving of life, together.

FACT OR FICTION FRIDAY -featuring the story of The Inheritance.

You have just attended the funeral of your Mother and your lawyer hands you a deed to a house you never knew existed.

Welcome back! We have been negligent in our posts as of late, however I thought it a good idea to return with a new segment: Fact or Fiction Friday!

Fridays will feature stories, either factual or fiction pertaining to, well, anything! This game originally started at an after school program. Events/stories, etc. were discussed and the school agers had to decide whether or not what they heard was fact or fiction. Now, there was a ghost story and whether or not you believe in ghosts this also fell into fact or fiction based on if it was a reported incident in the news or if it was a fiction story from a movie/book, etc.

This is how it works: at the beginning of the story you will read: Fact or Fiction. Anything written after those words may be true or not. When you read: Fact or Fiction at the end, this means the story is finished and what is written after that is not part of the game.

Let's begin!

FACT OR FICTION

The Inheritance

All people, places and events have been altered to protect the identity of those involved.

A few decades ago a young lady named Amy lost her Mother in a car accident. Her Father had passed only a few months prior due to health related issues. She had no other family as both parents were the only child, and her younger brother died when he was just 8 years old after jumping into the pond and cracking his head on a rock.

After the funeral the family lawyer informed Amy of her new car and house. A Mach 1 Mustang. This I remember!

Apparently Amy had no idea her Mother owned either car or another house as they were not a close knit family. She had moved out in her teens.

She left for the mystery house right after the funeral. It was hours away from where her family lived, out in the country down a rut filled dirt road. She had to park up on the hill and walk to the driveway.

No one knew she had gone to find the home. This is important to know.

The house was covered with vines and hidden by a forest of trees and brush. At the back of the house the garage had been cleared just enough to install a camera. This is important to know.

A strange man approached her, appearing to be in his 20's and asked who she was and if she needed any assistance. Obviously Amy was startled and she searched her purse for something in which to protect herself. When she looked back up, the stranger was gone.

She had to enter the house by the back door.

She entered the home and saw the house was under renovations. The kitchen was gutted, new cupboards were still in their boxes, the floor was torn up and the walls were stripped to the studs.

Amy wandered the home and went upstairs. These stairs were very steep and slick. White and shiny. This too is important.

There was a large room before her with two doors at the one end of the farthest wall. She went to the furthest door, the one on the left, and found inside a tiny room filled almost to the ceiling with cardboard boxes. When she opened one after the other, she saw men's clothes. Leather jackets, jeans, casual dress shirts, loafers, and so on. Her Father never wore anything other than suits and button up dress shirts when he was relaxing.

She left the room, obviously confused and went to the remaining room on the right. When she tried to open this door, she was met with some resistance. After pushing she discovered why.

The room looked recently decorated. The floor was newly carpeted with plush white carpet, soft green walls, an antique rocking chair in the corner by the window with a small ornate table and lamp to the right. It also smelled of lavender which was unusual. She knew this meant her Mother had been there recently, otherwise the smell wouldn't be as strong as it was.

She saw a threatening letter addressed to her Mother from someone claiming to be related to her Father. She figured this the reason for the camera at the back of the house.

She closed the door behind her and saw a few feet from the ceiling a 3X3 foot cupboard. When she opened it there was nothing to see but when she reached in and felt around she found 2 small boxes. One was a large shoe box and the other a fancy metal container.

This is where things get really interesting.

She opened the shoe box and found letters addressed to her Mother from a man she had never heard of. She opened several and discovered they were love letters. One in particular struck her as odd as it mentioned her Father's name, Owen. The writer of the letters, who she saw from his signature was named Quinn, wrote how he didn't trust her Father and he wanted her Mother to stay away from him, he was dangerous.

Amy read most all of the letters as they were scattered about the floor. The metal container had only a few objects in it, but what they were changed her life forever.

There was 2 wedding rings, engraved with her Mother's name: Sophie, and the stranger's name: Quinn! There was a small wedding album with pictures of her Mother marrying Quinn, their honeymoon and the last picture was of the house. A birth certificate with her name and the names of her Mother and Quinn were listed as her parents! The last remaining item in the box was a picture of a man holding a baby. On the back of the picture read: Me and my baby girl Amy! The man in the picture was the man who had approached her outside only minutes before!

The most disturbing of the letters from the shoebox was the one in which Quinn wrote in a scribbled hand that he loved her Mother and that Owen did it.

Now, what I haven't mentioned is that Quinn was found at the bottom of the stairs, in this house, dead with the scribbled note in his hand. He died the year Amy was born.

In the large room at the top of the stairs was a crib, basinet and all items related to having a baby.

Amy knew the man she thought was her Father was in fact the man who murdered her biological Father.

As you can imagine this was devastating. She never did find out why her Mother married a killer or why Owen killed Quinn. She never knew.

She raced back to the box filled room and dug through the boxes, finding the leather jacket. She put it on, grabbed her baby picture and headed to the stairs.

When she approached the stairs, she saw the man from the picture standing at the bottom, looking up at her and smiling. Her Father. No one knows exactly what happened, but it is assumed she started down the stairs, twisted her ankle and fell to her death, the baby picture floating out of her hand and landing beside her body.

Now since then the house has been cleared of all overgrown trees, brush, etc. You can see to the right of the picture, where she would have entered the house up the back steps of the deck.

Fact or Fiction?

Now, I have either embellished the facts with what I believed to have happened, since we will never know if this person actually saw anyone at the bottom of the stairs, or I have made up the entire story.

What do you think?

Have fun figuring it out! The answer will be posted on the next Fact of Fiction Friday!!! Please share your answers in the comment section!!!