I find it very hard not to hate some times....

With great sadness, I must report that Mitzi, the Saint Bernard pictured below, underwent an emergency C section on Saturday, resulting in ten healthy pups. Tragically, Mitzi herself, weakened by the neglect and strain of carrying her pups, did not survive. They were unable to stop the bleeding and lost her on the table.

Some may call it sentimental foolishness or unwarranted anthropormorphism, but I want to believe that on some level, she cared about her pups and knew they would be safe.

During her last week, which might have been her first week as an inside dog, Mitzi began to relax in her safety. Her foster mom reported that Mitzi often came over and just looked up at her, sighed happily and tentatively asked for a pat. She was just beginning to trust and become the Saint she was meant to be when we lost her.

Mitzi was willing to give people another chance. I'm not so sure I'm that good of a being. I look at a case like Mitzi's -- and let's face it, we've all seen more horrible ACTIVE abuse than the simple gross neglect Mitzi suffered -- but I look at a big, gentle dog like Mitzi and I know that there is evil in the world. What kind of miserable human being allows so many litters to be produced and does not provide basic medical care? To be pregnant and covered with filthy and fleas? To be so thin and weak? And then to be turned in at a kill shelter, left outside in an uncovered cement run while a week away from giving birth?

How do I wrap my mind around the concept of a person who could do that? It is so far from what I think of as being a human being that I just don't get it. I understand desperate circumstances, I understand poverty -- but was there no other way? Nothing else at any point in time that this sorry excuse for a human being could have done?

I don't know, people. I just don't know. I. Don't. Know.

Such sadness.