My first glimpse of Big Red was a little after midnight on a bitterly cold night. I was anxious to get home after traveling the sixty-mile commute from my job at the Post Office in Dallas and was barely a mile away. My headlights picked up movement on the side of the road and I slowed immediately, thinking it might be a deer because of its size. But no. She was as big as a doe but she was a great big ole hound dog or perhaps a greyhound. Her backbone was humped up in the familiar painful arch of a shorthaired dog that is very cold and she was so thin the outline of every rib was clearly visible. To make matters worse, she had no hair!

I felt such compassion for the obvious suffering of this wretched creature, I could feel the tears rolling down my cheeks. I could never get used to it, though what I was seeing was a common sight, and my heart was aching for her. I knew exactly what had happened. People who live in the country have to deal with it all time. Refusing the option of taking her to a humane animal shelter, her unfeeling owner chose to 'drop' her off out there, easing his conscience by assuring himself that someone would take pity on her and give her a home.

I stopped the car and got out but when she saw me, not trusting me, she loped across the field and of course, I couldn't follow her there. When a dog has been 'dropped' like that, it has a very tough time trying to find something to eat. Residents in the area, having been victims too often of dog-dumping, don't want another dog to feed so they run the stray off, yelling at them if they approach their home. And if they do have dogs of their own, many sic them on the stray thus making it even more fearful. They definitely won't feed the dog because everyone knows if you do that, the dog will stay right there.

With a heavy heart, I went on home, put some dog food in a shoebox and carried it back to the vicinity I had last seen her. I hoped she would find it the next day.

I didn't see her the next day or two, but couldn't get the haunting image of her out of my mind for I knew she was suffering. We were having a very unusual cold spell for our area; the temperature was falling into the low teens at night and no warmer than twenty degrees in the daytime.

A day or two later, my husband was looking out the glass door toward the lake behind our house. All at once, he exclaimed, "I think I just saw a deer run behind the storage building. They sure are getting brave. Boy, it was really moving!" Immediately, I knew it was the dog, for I remembered my first impression. I told him it must be the stray dog I had seen a couple of days ago.

My heart thumping with excitement at a second chance to rescue her, I grabbed some bacon on the stove left from breakfast, went outside and started calling softly in 'baby talk' that dogs respond to. "Here doggie, here doggie. Want something to eat, baby?" Now that poor baby was starving to death, and the smell of that bacon was more than she could stand. Even though she was trembling violently, (don't know which was worst for her, the fear or the cold), her hunger overcame her fear and she started crawling on her belly inch by inch toward my outstretched hand and the food. Of course, I was encouraging her every inch of the way with my soothing voice.

She practically inhaled the bit of food I had offered her. Calling to my husband to bring some dog food, I started petting her even though it wasn't pleasant touching her rough skin. I wanted her to know she had found a friend.

I had two or three dogs that were family pets and lived inside the home, but this dog was as big as a horse! Well, almost! She was the tallest dog I had ever seen when she was standing on her hind feet. I'm 5'6" and her nose reached my ears!

I didn't have a doghouse so the only way she could get warm was for me to take her inside the house. There was a small storage room that we kept a food freezer in, so I decided that would be a good place for her to keep warm until I could make other arrangements for her. I put a collar and leash on her and led her through the kitchen to get to the storage room. As she walked past the kitchen counters, her head was high enough that she could see what was on the counter!

The first thing on the agenda the next day was getting her to the vet. As I said, she didn't have any body hair and she itched so badly she had bitten and scratched herself so ferociously it caused the skin to break out in oozing sores. Through the years, I had seen poorly cared for dogs with mange but never this bad. I didn't think it was a big deal to cure her, but I was in for a big surprise. The vet said he thought she had Demodectic Mange, the type they inherit from their mother at birth and that affected dogs should be spayed/neutered to prevent passing the disease on to their offspring. I could tell he wasn't very optimistic about successfully treating her, but I just could not bear not giving her a chance after all she had been through. So I had her spayed and started the very expensive treatment for that type of mange. Antibiotics had to be used and big as she was, the cost was quite high. Besides that, she had to be bathed often with some type of smelly medication and because she was so big, we could only do it in our bathtub!

Though it took several weeks, the treatment was successful and her hair started coming back and it was red, thus her name could be nothing else but 'Big Red.' She gained her proper weight pretty quickly and her hair was sleek and shiny. She loved to run and she was a beautiful sight when doing so. Her body was poetry in motion. The long graceful stride belied just how fast she was moving and the muscles rippling in her back showed her strength and vitality. We had no way of knowing what her life was before we knew her, didn't even know if she was a pure breed dog or not, but I suspect she may have been a greyhound. She fit the description of the breed. My husband clocked her running 40 miles per hour along side his truck as he was leaving the house one day!

Caring pet owners know the joy a pet can bring into our lives. Of course, there are many different kids of pets, each with its own unique personality and lovable traits, but the most popular, by sheer numbers are dogs and cats. I have had both and also, parakeets who have their special kind of sweetness. But right now, I am speaking of dogs. They are so childlike in their innocence. They love you with every ounce of their being and the loyalty of a dog knows no bounds. He doesn't care what color you are, how old or how young, how rich or how poor you are, how dirty or how clean, he just loves you. If only humans were so loyal!.

Big Red came into our life, loving us to the max with her big heart. And for a time, she had a good life, living in the country and roaming free, enjoying our other dogs and our grandkids whom she enjoyed romping with. But sadly, it didn't last. As the vet had mentioned, her immune system was suspect and in a year or two, the mange reappeared. Not willing to give up hope, we went through the round of treatment again although it was time consuming as well as expensive. But when it came back the third time, though it tore my heart in two, I knew my love for Big Red would have to pass the test that most pet owners ultimately face.

I don't know the type of pain she was feeling, but she was in so much distress, she would hide out and howl piteously, the sound unlike any howl I had ever heard. I knew the time had come that I had to let her go. She could not speak for herself and could only depend on me. As with other pets before her, her suffering gave me the courage to act. So she, with me beside her, traversed that last mile, so to speak. We went into the vet's office that day and she was trustingly walking beside me, pushing up against my leg the way she liked to do sometimes..

It wasn't the first time I had been forced to make such a decision for a beloved pet that was a member of the family and it won't be the last. It's a heart-wrenching thing to do, but we do what we have to do. Some vets ask that you leave the room but I decline. I want to stay with my pets to the end, holding them in my arms until the medicine does its work and their body, pain-free at last, relaxes. I stayed with her, also, but she was so big I couldn't hold her in my lap with my arms about her while the shot was being administered as I had previously done with my small pets. She was sitting on her haunches beside my chair and as the vet knelt down and picked up one of her paws to start the procedure in her foreleg, she laid her head in my lap and looked up at me with those soulful brown love-filled eyes. Now, that loving and loyal heart no longer beats and her eyes can no longer see. Neither can I see, for my eyes are brimming with tears, even now as I recall the memories. The pain in my heart is the dull ache of emptiness, but strangely, there is a peace of sorts for I know Big Red is now free of her pain and suffering and has gone to where the good doggies go. She is waiting for our reunion at the Rainbow Bridge.