Saying Goodbye to "Cleo"
German Shepherds have always been our family's pet of choice until November 2015 when Loni decided that she was finally ready to get a dog of her own. Living in an apartment, there was no way that she would be able to get a German Shepherd so the search for a smaller dog breed began. The search did not last long because she soon discovered that a Collie mix would be the perfect dog for her active lifestyle and apartment.
As luck would have it, the first picture to pop up on Southeast Texas Humane Society's Facebook was a little amber and white collie mix named "Muffet" that was only 1 1/2 years old. It was love at first sight and after a few days, Loni went up to the Humane Society and did all the work to make the collie hers.
And this is how Cleopatra or "Cleo" was introduced into our lives. The first week, Cleo was scared and would never leave the couch. Loni had to pick her up and carry her everywhere. It was obvious she had a hard life before she was rescued. However, in just barely two weeks, Cleo was a brand new dog. She became so affectionate and excited to be around other dogs, and loved going for runs with Loni.
It was amazing to see a dog go from being so scared to being so happy in such a short period of time. It truly showed our family how amazing it is to rescue dogs and how important it is.
On January 2, 2016 Loni came home from work at about 11:30 p.m. and went to let her out to potty like she did every night. For some odd reason that we can still not figure out, Cleo took off running. Loni, just having ACL knee surgery, tried to run after her but could not keep up. Her friends (also her coworkers) searched the neighborhood around her apartment until finally her boyfriend, Matt, called her with the dreaded news. One of her coworkers found Cleo in the middle of the road after being hit by a car.Losing a pet is always hard and this was no exception. However, having Cleo taught everybody one thing: the power of love is an amazing thing. In the short period of time that we had her, you could tell that she felt loved and she was happy. Having Cleo only secured our idea of having a rescue and made us realize the importance of what we were trying to do. Because of Cleo we knew that this "rescue idea" should not just be an idea to wait on but that we should go ahead and get started.