I don't know if I've told you this, but when we got Kinley at six months old he had what I thought was a cyst in his ear. Turns out it was lead shot from a shotgun. In fact, he has a few deep in his body, not unusual, I'm afraid, for dogs from rural areas.
He must have been shot when he was about four months old. Yep.
Anyhow, after my vet removed it, I took it home and put it aside for some reason, then one day I tossed it. I didn't tell Gabriel about it because how do you explain to a young child the reasons why an adult would shoot a puppy?
Somewhere along the line he picked up that this had happened, from a conversation or really, I have no idea. So yesterday out of nowhere he tell me he knows why someone shot Kinley.
His reasoning goes something like this.
Kinley belonged to a hunter. The hunter liked to hunt wolves for their pelt. One day the hunter wanted Kinley to hunt a wolf but Kinley said no because they are in the dog family. So the hunter shot him.
Then he asks "I wonder how that person is now?"
I tell him that I don't know. To which he responds "Maybe they are dead."
And that was it. I thought it was pretty interesting to see how a nine year old tries to make sense of something so unfathomable. It makes me wish I could explain away a great many things with a noble story.
But I have a boy who still can. That's worth something, that is.
ohhhh. :( They are only young and innocent for so long. Don't you wish it would last forever?
ReplyDeleteWas it scattershot, Holly? It's just possible that it was an accident, though yes, I'm trying to put the best possible spin on it..
ReplyDeleteGlad you do what you do, and living in an apartment where even a goldfish is verboten, all I can do is love animals vicariously through friends' companions..
Miz,
ReplyDeleteBecause I work with rural shelters it's more often then not deliberate. People chasing strays off the chickens, things like that. Kinley is very reactive to certain things, almost two years later and putting his collar on is a process.
I'm not one to call every dog who is hand shy abused, but I don't think his story is a pretty one.
Not even goldfish?
His two biggest triggers were (of all things) old ladies and guys that looked like Santa. The guys had to have the whole beard AND belly and the ladies had to me old, old.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, we avoid McDonalds Sunday mornings from now on,lol. He's better, but he's still a bit of a work in progress.
To top it off he and baxter got in a fight Sunday with Baxter coming out the worse for wear, they both had punctures, Baxter's leg has a nasty bite.
So there is a lot of supervising on this end and we just hope it doesn't happen again. Which reminds me it's time to give Baxter his $70 antibiotic.
*sigh*
Yes, apparently I have to be here a year before the loandlady 'decides' tha tI'm worthy of extremely small pet ownership...hope to be outta here way before then...
ReplyDeleteKnow what you mean about expensive meds..I had a cat that cost me $3000 in vet bills over 9 years (heh heh, yeah, one for each life) and all the problems were from fighting-other cats, dogs, racoons (which, finally, were the death of him) And yes, he was fixed, he just didn't know it...