our worst day here

It's going to take a while to write this post with one hand.

My right arm is out of commission, which is very upsetting as Sunday, I received an invitation to my first piano gig on Saturday nights, and now I will have to delay that gig for at least 2 months.

Remember those Rottweilers a few houses down?  This attack was the worst yet.

We were trying to be responsible dog owners and had The Thug wear a muzzle for our beach walk.

When he ran to the neighbour's gate, we thought it would be fine because we were told the wicked woman had moved with her dogs.

She was back, and so was the pack.

They grabbed The Thug by the muzzle and all three of them started to tear at the flesh on his face and head.

Our poor baby had no defence because of the muzzle he was wearing, and the dogs pulled at him so hard his head was pulled right through the fence.

Now they had the advantage because his head was stuck and the three of these dogs really went to town ripping and tearing at The Thug's face, ears, eye and mouth.

We threw rocks, sticks, hit them on the head with the ends of the leashes, until finally, I tried to reached in to pull one of them off.

Instead of helping our sweet boy, I wound up with the Rottweiler's jaw clamped on my forearm.

Flipping my arm about like it was a rag doll, he looked like he was having a great time with the newest toy to enter his space.

Yet, the original toy, our dog, was more enticing and he let go of me to further work on ripping the face off our dog.

I ran screaming to the village for help and lucky for us, everyone came running.

By the time we all got back to the fence, The Thug had gone limp.  I truly believed he was dead.

Not only that, Papi had been bitten as well.

But the men grabbed coconut palm leaves and used the hard ends of the leaves to ward off the dogs.  Looking like lion tamers with a chair and whip, they held off the dogs while a few of us kicked in a part of the fence to help pull out our big boy.

There is nothing heavier than an 80 pound Pitbull who has gone limp after you've had your arm bitten by a Rottweiler.

But I didn't feel the pain of my arm at this point.  My whole mission was just to get my baby out of the fence so that they couldn't remove his entire head from his neck.

There was so much blood I couldn't even tell what his injuries were.

As the owner sauntered toward us, I yelled, "Get these doors fixed!  NOW!" followed by, "Now I need the hospital!" and finished off with giving her the finger and a scream of, "Fuck YOU!!!"  That's a language she understands even if my Spanish was lacking.

Unfortunately, on this North Coast of the island, there are no emergency vets.

We had to leave our sweet baby with Dominican Daddy to watch over him, while we rushed ourselves to the hospital to deal with our own lacerations.

Without getting too graphic for you, we both found that the flesh of our arms was exiting our wounds.

Fleshy bits where they shouldn't be.

It takes 30 minutes to drive to the hospital here.  It was the longest 30 minutes ever.

When we got there, because I couldn't move my fingers, they thought I had a broken arm, which would not be hard to fathom, considering who bit us.

However, I have learned since my motorcycle accident that I have the world's strongest bones and nothing was broken.

I visited The Thug at Dr. Bob's again today to see how he was doing.

He is completely despondent and wouldn't even lift his head when he saw me.

I truly believe he thinks we've given up on him.

Tomorrow he comes home.  Tomorrow can't come soon enough.

Papi, The Thug and I all have some healing to do.  Emotionally and physically.

People in the village have gone back and asked her to fix her gate, because her dogs have not only bit our dogs and us, but they have also bitten a child.

Her response?  "It's not my problem.  This is my house.  I don't need to fix it."

In this crazy, wild west of the Dominican Republic, it is not abnormal for people to be killed when an entire village is outraged.

I just hope they don't poison the dogs.  It's not their fault.  They have not been socialized.

She is the one who is evil.

And I will never put a muzzle on my dog again.

i treasure every day i am living