The dog no one wanted…

“Too big.”
“Too loud.”
“Too strong.”
“Too aggressive.”
“Too naughty.”
“She runs away too often.”
How many times had she been brought back to the shelter?
Sarah didn’t know any of that.
All she knew was this:
For a creature who wanted nothing more than to run wild & free,
She was dying a little, every day, in this tiny cage, at the Norfolk Animal Shelter.
Eventually people stopped taking a chance on her.
And so, day after day, Sarah stared listlessly out of the cage,
with her big, baleful, brown eyes.
Until one day, her beautiful brown eyes met another pair:
But these brown eyes were kind, twinkly, loving, and full of promise.
A 9 yr. old troublemaker that no one else wanted sounded perfect to Samantha.
And so, as had happened many times before,
Sarah was loaded into a car and driven to another new home.
But this time, something was different.
Samantha offered Sarah unconditional love and acceptance;
Samantha loved Sarah for who she was, not who people wanted her to be.
In the beginning Sarah still ran away, daily, weekly.
Always looking for something. What was it?
Freedom? The home she had once loved and lost?
But Samantha cheerfully chased after her, and always brought her back home.
Not back to the animal shelter.
Eventually Sarah moved with Samantha to a big house and yard in a small town,
Where Sarah finally had all of the room and love she had always craved.
A funny thing happened at the new house: Sarah eventually stopped running.
And when she did run….she ran home.
Sarah had found what she was looking for.
Because for Samantha, Sarah wasn’t too anything, except too perfect.
Sarah’s only real fault,
Like that of all dogs,
Was that her time with us was too short.
And so on a cold December day, Sarah left us,
But not before Samantha made Sarah’s last two years, the best of her whole life.
Farewell, sweet Sarah. Thank you for coming home to us.