There is a little tree frog, not much bigger than your thumb, who croaks outside our
bedroom at night. Pasado's Safe Haven is blessed with 80 acres of woodland and in
Springtime, hundreds of his friends can be heard. A creek, where fresh, frigid mountain
water pours when the snow melts in the high Cascades, is home to them. That is where
you will hear a cacophony of chirping, calling for girlfriends; looking for a way to continue
life.

We wonder why this little guy is still here. All alone. Chirping. When his friends have all
gone. He calls for a friend. We wonder what he is saying.

Then we'd take Harriett back to her sling, in her cage, and say goodnight. The next
morning, the process would begin all over again. On weekends, Harriett would continue
her special treatment, many times in the arms of others. Saturday nights, especially, the
people we share a life of animal rescue with, many times come together. One would
think when you work with people every day, you'd rarely want to see them on your time off.
But the people who save animals at Pasado's are those you want to call your family. And
actually, you feel closer to many times, than family: we all share the same passion, the
same anger, emotion, and tears. And frequently, it is a need to get together on a Saturday
night and just blow off steam. To laugh, and yes cry, but to help each other heal - with a
joke, a game of Scrabble, and certainly with a glass of wine.

Harriett was passed from player to player, during more than one friendly game of poker.
Her legs would be extended, for twenty or so minutes, as strategy was mulled, and then
she would be moved to the next lap.

All this effort went on for 8 months. We tried special diets, different medications, and
continued the therapy. But she never walked. Until one sunny, Spring day.

One warm morning, Mark and I took a moment to sit in the garden and enjoy the sun that
had finally returned to Seattle. It had been a long, dark winter. We had taken Harriett out of
her sling and placed her on a green, leafy plant that had burst out of the chilly soil a few
weeks before. She sat upright, with her rigid legs tautly stretched out in front of her. As
usual. We'd "talk" to her, she'd "talk" back. A crow would fly over, and she'd tilt her head
skyward and "talk" to it, too. We expected that she dreamed that she, too, could do that
one day. We silently hoped "if only she could just stand". That, would be good enough for
us.

As we watched the first hummingbird of the season scout the still desolate garden
patch, Harriett began flapping her wings wildly. She'd never done this before and we had
no idea what was going on. But she kept it up. For a minute, then two, three. And almost
like an old bi-plane waiting for the hand-turned propeller to spin fast-enough, her wings
finally lifted her up. She was STANDING! Mark and I literally said not a word. I grabbed his
thigh, as he sat next to me - I almost feared if I said anything, it would jinx it. "Don’t get
your hopes up," he said. We still couldn't speak. And then, she took a step.

I will remember that moment - that feeling of elation, until the day I die.

That fall, Harriett was still going strong, until the evenings took a turn for the cooler. She
began stumbling, at first. And then, over just a few days, her legs went straight out. She
couldn't walk. Back in the sling she went. She joined us in bed for physical therapy, and
yes, when the occasional poker game took place, she was there as lead dealer. We
also learned during that time that she loved kernel corn. Whoever held her and forced her
through, what was a painful experience of stretching and exercising her legs, would
"reward" her by hand-feeding her a small bowl of corn. Tiny Tupperware containers from
our kitchen, purchased to store nuts, and olives and other things we ate, became
Harriett's dinner plates.

This time, only a few weeks went by, and Harriett stood again. We found, over the next
two and a half years, that cooler weather or sometimes for no reason at all, she would
"go down" again. Veterinarians told us she probably had a congenital deformity in her
spine and when inflammation set in, she couldn't walk. But each time, she would "come
back" quicker than the last. So we were thrilled.

Then Hurricane Katrina hit. It was early September and we turned on the TV and saw a
dog clinging to a tree in New Orleans, as the flood waters rushed by him. Not enough
people were helping the animals get out fast enough. We had to go. Of the six people
who worked at Pasado's (that included me and Mark), three left to lead the effort, which
would keep them in the Gulf for two months.

I stayed behind to care for our own animals and to "do" the website, one of my jobs. It
was up to me to get the PasadoRescue team anything they needed, as fast as I could. If
they needed dog kennels, catch poles, flea medication, anything at all, I posted the plea
on our website, staying awake nearly twenty hours a day for the first few weeks. It was a
mad effort to save as many lives as fast as we could. Time was the enemy. And YOU, the
people who read this website, responded to my pleas with donations of money or the
literal items we were desperately asking for. I moved my computer into my home so I
could live, sleep, and eat at it.

And then, Harriett stopped walking. In the middle of all the hell, when I didn't have time to
shower every day, let alone care for an animal who needed one-on-one, she "went
down". Since I was locked on my computer nearly 24/7, I placed her in her sling on my
desk and would move her onto my lap while I fielded e-mails and updated the website,
sometimes every 15 minutes round-the-clock. Late at night, I'd finally go to bed, and
Harriett would come with me. I'd give her as much physical therapy as I could. Since New
Orleans was two hours ahead, and the teams were on-the-road at five in the morning to
head into the city to rescue, I had to be up at 3:00am to answer their phone calls. But one
night, when I went to bed with Harriett, I never got up to take her to her cage to put her to
bed. We fell asleep together, along with the dogs and the cats in bed. I woke, to find her
cuddled next to me. She was such a good companion. She never moved off of her towel,
or pooped on the sheets. From that night forward, she joined me for her PT and just
stayed with me.

It was about 4:30am-ish, a glint of light to greet the day, when we awakened by the
loudest crow you can imagine. Discombobulated, in the middle of a dream state, we stared at a "hen", in the middle of our pillows, crowing.

Harriett - WAS A MAN!