The Common Goal

There is no argument that the focus of everyone's immense efforts here is the animals. 

Me, and the compound kitty, Mitsi.. I do LOVE her!

To have such a strong common goal is the only way this many craggy, crazy people, all deprived of sleep, food, warm comfortable beds and all of the amenities associated with running water, AND, being from all corners of the UK, (and me the single American), could coexist together for weeks on end. Life here is complicated, and full of tragedies. People are trying to live normal lives, but, it is obvious that isn't possible here. Because of the poor living conditions, the overarching fear of air raids, bombs, and all of the insecurities war can present it is difficult to lose your way if you don't have a common goal and purpose. It is the glue that keeps us cohesive. If we didn't have this I am sure all of the ragged edges of all of the hardships would crack us. I am also sure that I am the person who fits in the least here. (I think I am proud of that.)

The depth and width of the pet dilemma that is here is oceanic. Mind boggling. This is a country that has very few frivolities. Dogs roam. Cats roam. People trudge in ratty clothes, and everyone sweeps bent over, scoliosis, kyphosis, nose to the dirt, sweep, sweep, sweep. An old country, old people, old stories of war, a country of tales of having been claimed by others, broken away from them, the castaway step-child and the weight of the world with whom you never know who you will saluting to lives here. These people have so much to manage already that the pets, the kind animals, are stepped over and passed by. To be honest there is probably no way to even begin to suggest an end to this mess. As the war drags on the problems deepen, intensify and coalesce. The lesion this began as has become a metastatic cancer of a wound that never received adequate treatment to begin with. How do we try to end the plight of these animals when we started at accepted indifference?

The animals here, at the compound I stay at, were all extracted (the term they all use) from the streets and abandoned shelters after they lost their residencies to the bombs that their homes became Russian targets of. They are all scarred. Some with obvious wounds, others with anxiety based fear so deeply embedded you don't want to know the source, or, excise the reason. You just assess, be kind, exude confident optimism and take small steps one heartbeat at a time. I am a fixer. I am wired to examine, dissect, treat, cure, and claim victory. here, each of these must be set aside. Reduced, and simplified to simply what I can do in the right here, presently, now. I will go mad, abandon the cause if I try to practice medicine like I do in my well controlled, everything accessible home. There are almost no spayed or neutered animals here. I assume with every tragic life threatening ailment that they come to me with they are also passing it forward to the half dozen offspring within them. Great, the problem multiples as I gaze upon it. There is no end. No finishing point.

The dogs here at the compound came from a shelter in Alexandria Ukraine. The shelter before the war used to run with a capacity of about 40 dogs and cats. When the war hit the numbers surged to 400. When the staff could no longer manage the animals and the war they reduced the care to feeding alone. No cleaning and no exercising. When the threat of further invasions and insecurities presented the shelter staff had to make an even more perilous decision. They opened the cage doors so the pets would not be left to starve. The group when in weeks ago to find many of the animals set free from their cages. The scene they came upon was about 150 animals alive the rest in some form of eaten. It is what we would all be faced with if 5 weeks went by without food or water. The weak, gentle and submissive were not who were left to rescue. Most of these dogs are German Shepherds. All are thin, matted, and apprehensive of humans. this is what war looks like. The war of abandoning human kindness and compassion. It is the face of people we should never be reduced to become. It is also why I am here.

I wonder if as the days pass that I won’t grow more indifferent to this place then desiring to stay and help? It is the same dilemma I face at home as a veterinarian. Do I give up as others have to save my fragile soul, or provide it with barricades shrouded in tattered clothes and fight on?