For a few years, I volunteered as a dog walker at my local humane society. For two hours a week, through the cold of Michigan winters and in the even more dreadful heat and humidity of summer, in rain and over slippery rain-slick or ice-slick ground, I walked as many dogs as I could. We were supposed to spend one-half hour with each dog, but if I did that, many dogs would have no chance that day to get out of their kennels to relieve themselves, to be away for just a few minutes from the grey concrete walls and the noise of the other dogs. So most days it was a new dog every 15 to 10 minutes.

Most of the dogwalkers walked the dogs in the public kennels, the ones who were up for adoption. It kept them from going kennel crazy and kept them adoptable. They were also guaranteed to have been vetted for behavior.

I liked to walk the strays and other dogs on the closed kennel. I felt tremendous sympathy for them. Many had homes but - either because of an accident or for a reason - here they were, in dog hell. The ones who had had homes were house trained. They would refuse to urinate or defecate in their runs, holding it in for more than a day if that’s what it took. The minute we walked out the back door, they would head for a huge tree 5 feet away and pee gallons. That poor tree, soaked in urine day after day.

Some of the dogs would graduate to the adoptable kennel. They had to be held for a couple weeks to see if anyone would come for them. And of course, that often happened. When one of my own dogs ran away, I picked him up there a few hours later. That was a year before I started dog walking.

Each humane society is separately run, and they have very different policies. This humane society made every effort to get dogs homes. They had an extensive list of volunteers who would foster dogs who were sick, needed socialization, needed time or when all the runs were full.

But there were certainly many dogs for whom there was no choice but euthanization. The closed kennel was full of vicious dogs brought in because they were dangerous. Many had been taught to fight and were at war with all the world.

Others were so old or sick, no one would ever adopt them, saints being in small numbers these days. Many of these had been let go by owners who could not face up to euthanizing these dogs and hoped someone else would deal with that decision. They removed collars and all ways of identifying their now decrepit pets. Those who were not killed by cars were picked up and put in dog hell for the two weeks we had to wait for an owner to show up. But those dog "owners" let themselves in for a different pain -- they have no knowledge of their dog's last days. But I can tell them. At best, their dog spent her last days living in a small concrete and metal run and died in harsh conditions, away from those they loved.

There were happy stories. There was Noah, a dog that was put down as unadoptable but for whom I fought to get a reassessment. As if by magic, as the assessor was checking his socialization level, a couple drove up, saw Noah and immediately bonded with him.

There were reunions. Dogs who were reunited with their humans, both frantic to get the paperwork done and be together.

There were wonderful dogs who were smart and trainable, who craved human attention and love, who retrieved the balls I threw, who wanted to be petted and brushed, who put the brakes on (they all did) when I took them back to their run.

There are dogs I will never forget. There was the huge orange dog - imagine a dog larger than a Great Dane with soft bright orange fur. He was so full of hope, attentive. He was clearly waiting for his people. His ears perked up at ever car noise, at every human. They drooped when he ascertained that these weren’t worth listening for - they weren’t his people. He tried to walk through the front gate to head home. He was longing personified. He was not a stray. The people he was waiting for had dropped him off there, back where they had adopted him as a puppy two years but he had outgrown the house, didn’t fit with the decor, didn’t fit with their lives.

People often asked me how I could bear walking dogs all those hours. I did have to quit because of back trouble. They asked how I could bear to leave the dogs locked in their cages.

But what I did was nothing. Some walk dogs every day and for more hours. Yes, I felt sad for the dogs. But the world is a sad place, so much evil on every hand. And there is so little any of us can do to set it right. But here in this kennel for two hours, I could know I had brought comfort and reduced the amount of suffering just a bit for just awhile. And that is the best any of us can do. Unfortunately, the worst we can do is so much worse.

For you are my hope, my trust from my youth - Do not cast me off in old age; when my strength fails, do not forsake me. – Psalm 71

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