by Linda Beane

Cleveland Animal Welfare Examiner

Cleveland has a population of approximately 396,815 people and creatures too numerous to count. Each of us lives here together yet singularly lives as individual sentient beings. To embrace life we must reach beyond ourselves and develop a compassion for all humans and animals on this isolated island of self.

Pause a moment, fully comprehend
"Self means alone."
Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.
Pretty easy concept.
Ever think about it?
Your aloneness.
Your uniqueness when referencing all sentient beings.
Alone.
ALONENESS
But it is a reality.
Let's explore this a bit.
Pinch your arm.
Yeah now,
Go ahead.
One of those beady, little, tiny, painful pinches.
You know the kind.
Slipped a few to someone once,
Didn't ya?
Another self, who needed a reminder of You,
Your oneness.
Your vulnerability.
Yeah, the big pinch.
Okay let's go for it.
Now just a good pinch, say on your arm.
OUCH!
HURTS!
Now say this out loud,
"I hurt me!"
Not good grammar.
But think about it.
Quietly,
Feel the pain.
No one else did?
No one ever will.
Pinch away, only you suffer.
This is your aloneness.
Forever.
The self, that is you, your oneness, your aloneness.
How many other selves are on this earth?
Not just humans, but all creatures.
All alone, inclusive to us with the same ability to suffer.
Can you feel that, their vulnerability.
Do you protect?
Each human self has a choice
Does your soul cry out when an animal suffers?
These innocent victims experiencing "alone" the tyranny of humans.
Do you see its aloneness?
The self?
THE ME?
Starved, abandoned, abused, entrapped, incinerated alive, chopped up,
butchered, scalded, beaten, tested, poisoned, tortured, raped, orphaned,
hunted, eaten, worn.
USED for the profit and pleasure of a callous other self!
Can you feel the pain here?
CAN YOU IMAGINE EACH TERROR?
IT IS A ME.
Think about that again.
Feel it.
Your aloneness?
Now take away your voice, your language,
Your status as a human.
You `re still a me.
I HURT YOU.
Now what?
You are powerless against ME.
PAIN?
What do you feel?
I feels pain!
I FEEL what all the me`s feel when hurt like this.
Alone and only self.
Human indiscretion of an indifferent ME has chosen to abuse your innocence.
(Readers are you understanding this?)
Because if you do, your "Self" suffers too.
You suffer and recognize the aloneness.
Feel their helplessness and confusion.
Your self can recognize their torment.
This compassion, separates us humans from each other.
Recognizing that we are all one.
Different species, but all one.
PINCH YOURSELF AGAIN,
HARDER.
Feel it, the individual pain only you suffer.
Self means alone.
Only a SELF can experience the pain.
Every animal abused, abandoned, terrorized or murdered experiences this same sense of self.
The loud echo of alone escapes no being, human or creature.
Use your life given power to protect.
SPEAK AND WORK FOR THE OPPRESSED AND ABUSED.
Stop the agonies and injustices, the tyranny against all animals.
QUIETLY NOW.....THINK AND FEEL THIS.....
Think---shhhhhhhhhh.
ME MEANS ALONE.
Listen.........
Hear it??????
"HELP ME, PLEASE!!!"
" THEY ARE HURTING ME!"
" I AM AFRAID!"
"Mommy you said you would never let anyone hurt me."
" But oh, me hurts so bad, me crying."
"Mommy?" "Mommy?"
"MOMMY!!!!!!!"
Oh me hurts............!