January, 2015:
The article below has just been published in Beach Metro Community News for my column, "PET OF THE MONTH"! Have a read and learn all about this special boy and his heartbreaking story!!

“Happy New Year!” – it’s something we say to each other every January. It’s a good thing too. We need all the optimism we can get. First, we need it for the small stuff like shedding the extra pounds we gained over the holidays or counting the days to spring - one back-breaking toss of the snow shovel at a time. And then there’s the big stuff, like world peace. We all know that’s a lofty goal.

 

            Alas, despite the annual encouragement of those three little words strung joyfully together like the festive lights on your Christmas tree – the now tinsel-free tree that’s losing needles AND the will to live face-down in the slush on the side of the road – happiness can seem like those old acquaintances we traditionally sing about on New Year’s Eve that we shouldn’t forget but sometimes do.

 

            Of course, that’s my inner Scrooge talking. My inner Tiny Tim prefers to believe even roadside slush has a silver lining if we happen to catch a glimpse when the sun is shining on it at just the right angle and at just the right moment! Yes, even the January blahs can turn BLING! I’ve got proof.

 

            It started with an old acquaintance that our beagle repair shop will never forget. We bid a sad farewell to him on Christmas Day of all days. He was a beagle we named Mortimer. It was around Christmas 2009 when we bailed old Morty out of a local animal shelter after he’d come in as a stray. He’d been guessed at 8 to 10 years old but those years hadn’t brought him much wisdom. Mortimer was terrified of practically everything. We’ll never know what made him that way but I can assure you he didn’t stay that way. Our plea to find a foster home for Mortimer led us to Denise and John, a couple who always seem to find the silver lining to everything. They would become Mortimer’s silver lining for the next 5 blissful years. He was their Mortimer-Muffin. Now who could forget a dog with a nickname like that?

 

            Just as Mortimer was preparing for his final departure, a miracle was unfolding in a barn north of the city. Aside from sheltering a tractor, the old barn no longer served any other purpose until one little beagle found his way to it just in the nick of time. He was badly injured. There were 18 puncture wounds around his neck, likely the result of an attack by wild animals. Prolonged exposure to the cold had left him frostbitten in several places and without any source of food, he was near starving.

 

            As good fortune would have it, the owner of the barn decided to pop by and check on the tractor. It was still there alright and next to it, curled up in a tight little ball, was a trembling beagle she didn’t expect would survive the trip to the local animal shelter. But he did. After 2 weeks in hospital hooked up to IV fluids, he was well on his way to a complete recovery except for one thing. The little beagle who survived against-all-odds was still riddled with wounds we can’t see with our eyes. Like Mortimer 5 years prior, this poor beagle was terrified of everything. And like Mortimer, we’ll never know why. But also like Mortimer, he wasn’t going to stay that way.

 

            We got the call from the shelter in Port Perry on January 7^th asking if we had room to take in a painfully shy young beagle that narrowly escaped death and needed a rescue like ours to help heal his wounds on the inside. That call came in around the same time I was getting all “hum-buggy” about the New Year so far. It was also probably around the same time Denise was saying to a friend, “We don’t plan on getting another beagle just yet. Unless one falls in our laps, I think our hearts need time to heal”.

 

            Let’s just say our first rescue case of the year, the beagle-tailed barn swallow we named Elton, made a precision landing into those unsuspecting laps. Once in the nest, all it took was his wide-eyed expression of hope for a future filled with tail-wagging moments for Denise and John to see that they didn’t need time to heal their hearts. All they really needed was a beagle in desperate search of his silver lining.

 

            Elton’s invisible wounds have been healing ever since. He’s couch buddies with an older, wiser beagle named Molly who has no doubt told him all about his predecessor Mortimer the Magnificent and how he has very big paws to fill. Since the beginning of time, it’s been the job of big sisters to tease their little brothers. Little brothers have an equally important role to win over big sisters and by doing so, keep them young at heart. Aside from his brotherly responsibilities to Molly, Elton need only look cute in the turtle-neck sweater chosen just for him while he watches the dark clouds disappear one by one from above his head. With every gentle tickle of his tummy and reassuring kiss on his freckled nose, Denise and John are gradually bringing Elton’s silver lining into view.

           

            My humbug days are over! With 365 days’ worth of beagle-infused optimism, I say “Happy New Year, Elton!”

           

Elton is an approximately 2-year-old beagle ringing in the New Year HAPPY at Big On Beagles (BOB) Rescue, www.bigonbeagles.ca ~ where every rescued beagle has a silver lining! Would you like to help our next beagle wag away the storm clouds and find his silver lining? Then become a foster parent and ring in the New Year with a beagle bang!