This is Fruitycake. Before I tell you how Girl Person asked for a sign and got more than she bargained for, will you join us on Patreon? For just $5 a month, you’ll get our FULL weekday blogs and audio blogs while helping us keep our rescue mission going for the long haul. Italy may be coming to an end, but our story isn’t. We need you for the chapters still to come. Join us at https://www.patreon.com/2travelingdogsrescue. Now, about that sign. Girl Person may never pray for another one again.

Be Careful When You Ask For A Sign. You Might Be Brought To Your Knees.

This is Fruitycake. There comes a time in every dog’s life when he realizes that his persons have absolutely no idea what they are doing. I reached that conclusion approximately five years ago, but this week has provided additional scientific evidence. Girl Person and Boy Person have been walking around our rustico with expressions usually reserved for persons who have accidentally swallowed a live bee. You know if that happened, they would still save the bee. 

They are trying to sell a house, leave a country, move across an ocean, arrange my international travel documents, my vet appointment in a city, figure out where we will live, pay for things they cannot afford and somehow continue helping rescue animals every single day. Girl Person makes lists. Boy Person records the pawcast with me even thru the worry, and they try to keep focused. Then Girl Person makes a list of things that need to be put on Boy Person’s list. I have suggested that everyone stop making lists and eat pizza, but apparently I am the only qualified crisis management professional in this household.

The truth is that leaving this Italy place is breaking their hearts. We have lived here among ancient stone walls, rebuilt the walls, olive trees, wild animals, waterfalls and enough mud to manufacture an entirely new continent. We have loved this place even when it has made absolutely no sense to love it. Girl Person has cried here, laughed here, fought that depression monster here and learned things about herself that she probably never wanted to know. Boy Person has carried groceries, water, supplies and approximately seventeen thousand things up a mountain that has never once offered to carry anything back. We have made a home where most persons would have looked around, asked where the driveway was and immediately called a taxi. And then there is Brickle. His resting place is here. His memory is in every stone and every path. Leaving this place means leaving a chapter of our lives that can never be written again.

So naturally, Girl Person started wondering if maybe we were making a terrible mistake. What if we stayed? What if we somehow found the money and strength to restore this old house? What if we could make it work? What if leaving meant giving up on something we were supposed to finish? These questions have been circling around her head like the mosquitoes in our bedroom during the summer. She has been so anxious that she has started having chest pains, and the stress of everything that needs to happen has been almost unbearable. I have tried placing my head on her lap, which usually fixes approximately 87 percent of human problems. But this particular problem seems to require more than one dog head.

And so Girl Person did something very dangerous.

She prayed for a sign.

She asked for some reassurance that leaving was the right thing to do. That they should not change their minds. That perhaps they were not meant to spend the rest of their lives trying to rebuild a centuries-old house on a mountain with no road. She wanted a little nudge. A whisper. A gentle confirmation from above.

Apparently, whoever was handling the sign department had recently been promoted from subtle suggestions to heavy machinery.

Because shortly afterward, Girl Person fell off the path.

Not a graceful little stumble. Not a charming Italian countryside moment where a woman trips over a pebble, brushes off her trousers and continues walking while violins play in the background. No. Girl Person went DOWN. She hurt herself badly, especially her knee, and suddenly the woman who had been wondering whether she could spend the next several years rebuilding an ancient house was having difficulty managing the ground directly beneath her feet.

And do you know where she fell?

THE EXACT SAME PLACE SHE FELL ON THE VERY FIRST DAY WE ARRIVED HERE.

Persons. I am a dog. I do not claim to understand divine communication, cosmic coincidence or the mysterious workings of the universe. But if you arrive at a place and fall down, then years later ask whether you should stay and immediately fall down in the exact same spot, I would at least consider the possibility that the mountain has submitted its final opinion.

But the mountain wasn’t finished.

Because just as Girl Person was trying to figure out which parts of her body were still attached, the wild pigs above us decided that this would be an excellent time for a dramatic stampede. Suddenly there was crashing and running and the unmistakable sound of enormous animals barreling down the hillside. I nearly broke off my leash because, as Head of Security, I felt it was my duty to investigate this situation immediately. Girl Person was injured, wild pigs were running through the woods and I was prepared to engage in international negotiations with an entire family of angry cinghiale.

I would like to point out that I handled myself magnificently. Girl Person has a slightly different version of events. She says that for one horrifying moment she thought she was going to lose her knee, her dog and possibly her mind all on the same mountain path.

Girl Person had asked for a sign. Instead, she received a fall, an injured knee, a wild pig evacuation drill and a very enthusiastic dog attempting to separate himself from his leash. I think we can safely say the message was delivered.

But after the laughter, and there has to be laughter because otherwise we would all be sitting around crying into our pasta, something much more serious remains. Girl Person and Boy Person are tired. Their bodies are tired. Their hearts are tired. They have spent years doing things that most persons would consider impossible. Every bag of groceries, every bottle of water, every piece of equipment and every necessity has had to be carried up and down these paths. Every repair requires more money, more physical effort and more uncertainty. They are not getting younger, although I have been instructed never to discuss this particular subject in public. They have poured everything they have into making a life here, and sometimes loving a place does not mean you are physically capable of staying. And you can’t rescue a house and animals at the same time in the ways they want to. 

I, personally, believe we could rebuild the house using sticks. I have already located several excellent structural sticks, a load-bearing branch and something that might be a roof if Boy Person would stop throwing it away. I could supervise the entire operation from a comfortable blanket. My architectural plans include a pizza oven, a cheese storage facility and absolutely no stairs. Unfortunately, Girl Person says sticks are not an approved restoration material in Portofino Park, and Boy Person says my proposed construction schedule of seventeen minutes is unrealistic.

But perhaps we have been trying to build the wrong kind of house.

Because the next house we need to build isn’t made of stone.

It is a house of hope.

A house of hope for the shelter dog who has watched hundreds of persons walk past his kennel without stopping. A house of hope for the older dog who thinks his best days are behind him. A house of hope for the person sitting alone in a room, fighting depression and wondering whether tomorrow is worth getting up for. A house of hope for animals whose stories have never been told and persons who need reminding that they still have something important to give this world.

And this brings me to our affirmation for October 28.

October 28 | I Will Do Something Today That Cannot Be Measured

TODAY’S AFFIRMATION

Not everything valuable becomes a number. Comfort, wonder, loyalty, laughter, beauty and presence matter even when nobody can count them. I will make room for something meaningful that produces no score.

Girl Person has been surrounded by numbers lately. The purchase price of the rustico. The possible closing date. The cost of getting back to America. The money we don’t have. The number of things still left to do. The number of hours in a day that never seem to be enough. And I think somewhere in all those calculations, she has started wondering whether we have accomplished enough here. Whether all these years of work, sacrifice and love add up to something that justifies how hard it has been. But how do you measure the comfort of a dog who sits beside you when you are crying? How do you calculate the value of a person who decides to stay alive another day because something you wrote made them feel less alone? How many euros is a sunset worth when you are watching it beside someone you love? And what is the market value of a dog who has spent five years supervising two very questionable persons and preventing them from making even worse decisions? I would imagine it is astronomical.

No spreadsheet has ever successfully measured the value of sitting beside your dog while rain hits the window. Believe me, I have tried. The spreadsheet kept asking for numbers, and I kept entering the word everything. Because that is what some moments are worth. Everything. And perhaps that is what Girl Person needs to remember as we prepare to leave. We may never be able to count every animal we have helped, every person we have encouraged or every heart that has been changed by the stories we have shared. We may never know the full value of our years in this Italy place. But that does not mean those years were wasted, and it certainly does not mean our work here was unfinished. Some of the most important things we build cannot be seen, sold, renovated or measured. They simply continue living in the hearts of others.

We want to help real rescue animals be seen, heard and believed in. Like me! Through Fruitycake’s Pawcast, we want dogs in shelters and homes to hear a happy voice telling them that they matter. Through our writing and our work, we want persons who feel forgotten to know they are not alone. We have spent years proving that rescue animals can change the world. Now we want to find new ways to help them do exactly that.

And perhaps the hardest part of all of this is accepting that you can love something with your whole heart and still know that it is time to leave. You can be grateful for the years you had and still be ready for something different. You can mourn a chapter before it is even over. You can be terrified of what comes next and still take the next step. Girl Person keeps waiting to feel completely certain, completely prepared and completely unafraid. I do not think that day is coming. I think sometimes courage looks like a woman with a sore knee, a worried heart, a dog pulling on his leash and a thousand unanswered questions who gets up and keeps walking anyway.

Of course, she should probably have that knee looked at first. And the chest pains too. Because even the most determined Girl Person in the world cannot keep carrying everyone else’s hopes if she does not take care of herself.

I have been watching her very closely since the fall. I can tell that she is frightened. I can tell that leaving this place feels like losing something, even though we are also gaining the chance to do something wonderful. I know she wonders whether she has enough strength left to start again. And I wish I could explain to her that she does not have to build the whole future today. She just has to keep believing there is a future worth building.

Sometimes the answer to a prayer may not arrive in the way we expect. Sometimes what feels like an ending is actually permission to begin again. I cannot tell you whether that fall was a sign or a terrible coincidence. But I do know that Girl Person was asking whether she could keep living this way, and afterward she found herself literally on her knees, facing the physical reality of what staying would mean.

Be careful when you ask for a sign. Sometimes life will bring you to your knees before you finally understand that it is time to stand up and walk in a different direction.

And to everyone reading this, perhaps you have your own mountain. Perhaps you have something you love but can no longer carry. Perhaps you are afraid that changing direction means you have failed. Please remember that there is a difference between giving up on your purpose and changing the way you pursue it. We are not giving up on rescue. We are not giving up on helping persons. We are not giving up on the promise we made to Brickle and Digby and every animal who has taught us what love can accomplish.

We are simply taking that promise somewhere new.

And we cannot do it alone.

We need you now. Not someday when everything is settled. Not when we have arrived safely in America and can tell everyone how we managed to get there. Now. While we are trying to get the paperwork completed, arrange my travel, prepare to leave, cover our immediate expenses and keep our rescue programs going. If our stories have ever made you laugh, cry, feel less alone or look at a shelter dog differently, please help us turn those stories into the next chapter of real rescue work. Please come with us. Won’t you? 

As for me, I have officially retired from the construction business. I will be taking my collection of sticks to America, where I intend to use them for recreational purposes only. I have also submitted a formal request that all future signs from the universe be delivered in the form of pizza. Preferably with extra cheese and absolutely no wild pigs.

Fruitycake

P.S. PLEASE HELP US GET READY TO LEAVE THIS ITALY PLACE.

Our tentative closing date is November 13, although it could change, and we are trying to handle the immediate expenses of preparing to leave Italy before we can even begin to figure out everything else.

Our special Getting Ready To Leave Italy Fund: Every gift helps with the preparations and expenses of getting us and Fruitycake ready for this move.

https://www.paypal.com/ncp/payment/JBCWYW7YJPJF6

Our very last Italy T-shirt! Help Fruitycake get ready to leave Italy and wear a reminder of the mission you are helping make possible.

https://www.bonfire.com/help-fruitycake-get-ready-to-leave-italy160

Our everyday necessities still matter. We still need to eat, keep warm, care for Fruitycake and get through each day while preparing for this move. Our necessities fund is separate from our moving preparations.

https://www.tinyurl.com/2tdnecessities

You can also help through Venmo @travelingdogs2 or Zelle rachael@2travelingdogs.com.

Please join or increase your Patreon support. For $5 a month, you can help sustain our weekday writing, audio blogs and rescue mission. If you are already a member and can increase your pledge, it would mean so much right now.

www.patreon.com/2travelingdogsrescue

Our 2027 calendars are available! Our Under The Crow and 2 Traveling Dogs calendars celebrate the memories and adventures that brought us to this moment. These are our last Italy calendars, and every purchase helps support our work.

Rustico calendar https://www.paypal.com/ncp/payment/SNB5CCR7YX5QL

2TD calendar https://www.paypal.com/ncp/payment/6TLHKT85EC9YL

And we desperately need sponsors for This Is…Me. We received ZERO sponsors this week. Zero. This project shares the real stories of real rescue animals in shelters and rescues, helping them be seen and giving them a better chance of finding a home. For just $35, you can sponsor one animal’s story and help us keep this program alive.

Sponsor a rescue animal’s story here:

https://www.paypal.com/ncp/payment/Q56YEJJTKXY96

Shelters and rescues can submit animals FREE to rachael@2travelingdogs.com.

And please keep listening to and sharing Fruitycake’s Pawcast, our free weekday podcast for dogs, by a dog. Play it for your dog, share it with a shelter and help us spread a little happiness.

Listen to a new episode every weekday!

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fruitycakes-pawcast/id6821955047

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2DaADtCEneeRL6L9TQXoQ4

We have given this mission everything we have. If you believe in us, please help us keep going. This is the moment when your support can make the difference between a dream that ends here and a house of hope that begins somewhere new.

Thank you for helping us stand back up, one step at a time.