It’s Time to Donate to Dale’s Fund
How many men do you know would agree to picking up a pit bull that has just been dumped on the side of the road while in the midst of a 300-mile move? That was Dale. He not only made no fuss about it, he held our Sweet Sade Sue in his lap the entire ride home.
“The only thing I wondered was how long it would take you to go back,” my husband said. We’d witnessed Sade being left at the side of the road, then running her heart out trying to catch up with the people in the car after they left her. When I turned around to go back for her, she was collapsed in an exhausted heap in a drainage ditch by the road.
I always thought my mother’s spirit sent her to us that hot evening in June 2007 because I told my mom before she died earlier that year that I would rescue a pit bull when we moved to Our Little House. Sade was the sweetest, most loveable dog we could have asked for. It broke our hearts when we lost her and Dakota within two days of each other last spring.
Dale knew I wanted to rescue as many homeless animals as we could afford when we moved to the country and he had no problem being a Dog Dad to all of the ones that came into our lives. And we typically had morethan we could afford, having up to seven once in 480-square feet, counting a foster.
Instead of taking a vacation or buying something he wanted, we typically found ourselves giving up tax refunds for surgeries, emergency treatment or routine vet care for our fur babies.
He never complained.
Instead, the last dog we acquired, Dexter, was his doing. He saw him running down the middle of the road on a cold, wet night and brought him home. I’m very thankful for Dexter. When I’m lonely and sad over losing my Dale, Dexter hops on my lap and is ready to comfort.
Now that Dale is gone, I obviously will not be able to rescue animals off of death row or stop and bring a stray home to add to the pack.
But we, as a community, can still help homeless animals and do it in Dale’s name.
Dale Campbell’s Forever Pet Connection Memorial Fund will help replenish the emergency funds The Pet Connection had to use in the past year to take in dogs and cats. Everyone I know in rescue tells me 2018 was a very challenging year, with all of them seeing animals in record numbers, and it was no exception for The Pet Connection.
The fundraising campaign will run through February 15, when The Pet Connection (a 501(C)3 charity) will hold an annual fundraiser at Unique Finds, 7940 Santa Fe Drive in Overland Park, Kansas, a store that sells art made by indigenous peoples around the world. There will be a band and food and an online auction. One of the items you can bid on is a weekend in The Belle Writers Studio. Reader’s Digest is also donating 3 copies of the paperback edition of our book, “Living Large in Our Little House: Thriving in 480 Square Feet with Six Dogs, a Husband and One Remote.” The book will be released in March and will include a special memorial to the man who made our dream here possible.
If you would like to donate to the fund now, go to our Facebook page and look for the fundraising note. Or, click on this link and make sure to put in the notes that it is for Dale Campbell’s Forever Pet Connection Memorial Fund.
If you would like to send a check, please make the check out to The Pet Connection, with a note about the fund in the memo section and mail it to:
The Pet Connection
Dale Campbell’s Forever Pet Connection Memorial Fund
417 N. Rawhide Dr.
Olathe, KS 66061
Thank you so much!
