20/06/2024
A Special Appeal for Sapphire 🐶
Sapphire, a 15 month old German Shepherd has been in our care for 16 weeks now. This beautiful girl has not had the best start in life and to find a perfect home for her is just what she needs. Please take the time to read her appeal and help us to help Sapphire find a new home....
Being called a Shepherd is, in a way, both the kindest of compliments and the most grievous of insults. You don’t know whether to blush and flutter your eyelashes at the person who uttered it, or to strike them with your glove and demand satisfaction. It implies that you’re clever, loyal, handsome, beautiful and loving, whilst also being daft, anxious, needy and a right royal pain in the posterior. They – as Walt Whitman put it – contain multitudes. And yet, for those who love their Shepherds, they wouldn’t have them any other way. I wouldn’t have Sapphire any other way. Mostly.
There’s truly no doubting Sapphire’s all-encompassing Shepherd-ness. In fact, she couldn’t be more of one if there was a crook clutched between her paws and a flock ringed about her. She has all the wonderful attributes – the beauty, the cleverness, the devotedness, the playfulness – as well as all the anxieties. She does have just cause though, her past has not been an easy one to bear. She was found living in a bathroom. That’s where she came from. Not a big one, certainly not a clean one, just a bathroom. Is it any wonder, therefore, that she suffers from fears and anxieties? How could she not? What twisted paths her life took that lead her to such a place will remain a mystery. But we must look forwards, upwards, towards the bright future that awaits her.
In spite of this, she is a joy to share time with. Her giddy, puppy playfulness, her confounding beauty, her unashamed love of toys, of treats, of walks and of you. Entirely you. She has that almost uniquely Shepherd habit of making you feel a hundred feet tall, such is her smile-wide devotion. As if the world only began to spin once you entered the room. She prances and barks and holds you around the waist. Her eyes fixed to yours. She guilt-trips you terribly when you have to leave her.
Sapphire can be shy around new people – and new situations – but this can typically be overcome by a combination of treats and toys. She knows her ‘sits’ and her ‘stays’ and her ‘paws’ and she will pick up a thousand more commands, such is her cleverness. She will need an empathetic, considerate owner who can spend plenty of time with her and one who doesn’t mind spending six months of the year grooming her rich, thick coat!
She is a stunning dog – in every which way – a true star. My life has been blessed by her being in it, my days brightened by her presence. That’s just who she is. A room-brightener, a cloud-dispeller, a stillness-smasher. A heart-holder. Such is Sapphire.
For more information please visit https://chesterfield-rspca.org.uk/sapphire-d2024009/
