Sometimes when one or a few persons are struggling to run their small
shelters, it seems as though their efforts are so much striving against
the windmill-sized unassailable giants of the abuse, neglect, and
indifference among the general public; especially against domestic
ferrets, for whom, as creatures in distress, who need care all their
brief lives, each shelter-person of every sort is their defending Knight.
Sometimes just the day-to-day workload, if you have no volunteers to
help, can break these hidden heroes down into feelings of wanting to
give up (So FIND a needy shelter and Do volunteer!  Know that there's
very probably one close to you, and struggling mightily!)  Sometimes,
especially for some of the unsung heroic single-person shelter operators,
it seems that solvency alone is an impossible dream.
 
Yet it's better to live striving the Impossible, every day.  Better to
reach up for that star, always with the other hand down beside you to
catch hold of the love ever there, in the small, furry forms of the very
ferrets you're sheltering, who will bolster your up-reaching.  And when
you've nearly attained that star, bring forward the loving creatures who
helped you attain it!  So that they might be the first to touch its
brilliant beauty...
 
To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go
 
To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star
 
This is my quest
To follow that star
No matter how hopeless
No matter how far
 
To fight for the right
Without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell
For a heavenly cause
 
And I know if I'll only be true
To this glorious quest
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm
When I'm laid to my rest
 
And the world will be better for this
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star
[Posted in FML issue 4697]