Barkley: A Dog's Journey Book

Phew.

This could easily turn into a rage review on my hatred for Michael Vick, even now all these years later. The beginning of this book is VERY graphic and hard to swallow and only added gasoline to my fire. I understand that he did his time, and he now has become an advocate for dogs, giving speeches and talking to people about the evils of dog-fighting. But actually reading just how involved he was in all of it (not only funding and watching the fights, but being one of the people to murder the dogs) just made me sick. I knew the dogs were being killed but reading just how they were killed upset me- I will not give examples, as I cannot even begin to type it without getting teary.

But this isn't about Vick, it's about the dogs. So let's talk about the dogs. =)

The one good thing about a celebrity being the one to be involved in this horrific crime is the huge spotlight it put on the dogs. If Michael Vick wasn't an NFL star, the dogs would have most likely all been euthanized the minute they were seized. The hatred of pitbulls in this country just astounds me. I have worked with pits and they are one of the best breeds. The media portrays them in such an ugly light and people just automatically pin them as mindless killing machines. I don't know of anyone personally who has been killed or injured by a pit. I understand people have, I'm not making light of it. But I have a scar on my lip from being bit in the face by a neighbor's cocker spaniel. And sadly, I know of a little girl who was so viciously bitten that she needed reconstructive surgery. The dog who did it? Her own golden retriever.

The dog's individual stories started out so heartbreaking but continued to be more and more uplifting as the book went on. The end statistics are so amazing to me: of the 51 dogs rescued from the Vick compound, only 1 had to be euthanized due to over-aggressiveness. 2 had to be put down for medical reasons. The remaining dogs went on to foster homes, forever homes, to become therapy dogs. The resilience of these animals is nothing short of amazing.