On Monday it was raining, absolutely pissing outside. My room faces the east and I’ve always liked that when there’s a storm I’m the first to hear it. Waking up to the rain wasn’t a bad thing, only shocking because I had fallen asleep to it the night before. I wasn’t expecting all the rain. I don’t think most people were.
I didn’t work until the afternoon that day so I took my time getting ready. I ate my breakfast, I did my daily tarot reading, I chose what I was going to wear to work. But as I was getting ready to write before my shift my dad asked me to search a phone number for him. He told me that there was an animal crying across the street, something stuck in the fence. He couldn’t see what it was, just a gray body, but that he wanted to call Animal Control to see if they could help it.
The SPCA should be the first choice, but we have lost a lot of respect for them. Years ago my dad found a hurt groundhog while he was walking, found a payphone1, and called the SPCA to come and help it. The SPCA told him that the groundhog wasn’t a priority so they would get there when they could. My dad stayed with the groundhog for two hours and the SPCA still hadn’t shown up. I don’t think they ever did. When I called them about a dove sitting in our garden on its last breath they said the animal was, again, not a priority. I know of an old fox that haunts a building, the poor thing covered with mange. A worker in the building has called the SPCA asking them to come and help the fox, but they replied that unless the fox was on death’s door they would not be coming.
Sarah O'Connor 