Sweet Honey, Free At Last

Honey

Honey, a fifteen-year-old greyhound mix, was recently dumped at a Los Angeles county shelter in Carson City because the owners couldn't or didn't want to pay for her medical expenses. She's an older dog with arthritis, a heart murmur, bad eyesight, and who knows what other health issues she might be dealing with. The shelter didn't bother treating her for anything and instead locked her up in the general holding area with the other dogs, a place that was often deafeningly loud with upwards of fifty dogs barking furiously, a place that stank of dirty animals and shit. We found her in a cage with a hard, cold concrete floor with only a thin blanket for this arthritic dog to lay on. They told us she wouldn't eat. She was also severely dehydrated. Apparently, she'd been at the shelter for a while, but she's not there now.

Joe and I busted her out of the shelter. A greyhound rescue organization in Ventura, CA, Homestretch Greyhound Rescue, found out about her and notified GreySave (the organization we're involved with in the San Fernando Valley). We got a call asking if we could check her out, positively identify her as a possible greyhound mix, and possibly get her out of there. We did. We took her back to our house to rest until a volunteer from Homestretch Greyhound Rescue could come get her. Homestretch is now making sure she gets the medical care she needs and a home that isn't a hellish, cold county shelter in which to spend the last part of her life. I will NEVER forget the incredible, heartbreaking sadness and abject misery in this dog's eyes when we first saw her, nor her happy sigh when she relaxed on a comfy pillow bed in our warm living room while waiting for the Homestretch people to arrive.

Sweet Honey, free at last!