The Hard Times of an Artistic Animal Lover

Mikko

It has been a tough summer when it comes to my animals. Our beloved shiba inu Mikko left us, and tomorrow our sweet cat Tiger is crossing over the rainbow bridge. She has cancer. There is nothing to do but not make her suffer any longer.  

Tiger has had a short but eventful life. She is a five-year-old former barn cat from my daughter's farm. Due to a spine injury she came to live with us. Now she is an indoor pampered princess, at least for another day. It turns out the spine injury was really cancer. 

Loving animals is easy. It's the letting go that's hard. 

Tiger

Despite the pain of saying goodbye, animals have added so much to my life. I can't imagine not having one. If you look through my portfolio or read my stories, a majority of them include animals. I have a book coming in the spring about a horse. The story was inspired by my horse GusGus. 

Brave Old Blue is about a horse that is taken in by a horse rescue and little girl name Bobby. Through love and kindness, Old Blue is taught to trust again. He finds a home at the horse rescue and thanks to the unconditional love from Bobby, he is safe. 

Often people say animals give unconditional love. I don't think that's true. If you mistreat an animal, it will not trust you. It will be afraid of you. You must unconditionally love an animal before the full reward of having one in your life is realized. Now that doesn't mean there aren't rules. It isn't safe for my horse to think he can do what he wants. He has guidelines that I carefully show him to help us both be safe. But it's how you implement and enforce those guidelines that matter. Some people are better at this than the rest of us. My horse trainer Ellen Kealey is a true horse whisperer. 

When I was doing research for Brave Old Blue, I met Renne at GRG Ranch Horse Rescue and Sanctuary. Now she could teach all of us something about how to treat animals, especially horses. I was so moved by Renne and her work with horses, I have decided to donate 25% of my royalties from Brave Old Blue to GRG Ranch. 

Even though this post has some hard, sad news. I want you to go away understanding how much animals have given me. And they just keep giving to everyone who sees my art or reads my stories. 

So, if you notice a lot of Mikko drawings or Tiger paintings in my Instagram feed, you can understand where the inspiration comes from. 

Colleen 💕