I've just arrived on this scene, and it seems as if just about everyone is making this very binary, with only the extremes as options. Even if it were in dire straits, Hamerton isn't going to hand its keys over to the Council; they and all of the other respected zoos in our countries are led by people who respect and love wild animals. Any zoo that can not survive financially will most certainly find placements for their animals, not merely toss the keys and walk away. And there is no doubt in my mind that these rare animals will be snapped up in a heartbeat by zoos that are on sounder financial footing, especially since they will come cheap or free with the costs of their care not a lump-sum expense today, but one stretching out into the future, one day at a time. I've read nearly all of you for years now, and I honestly think that if we weren't so stressed right now (I know, I live in the state with the fastest-growing case and mortality rate in the country) we would all be looking at things in much finer shades of gray, not this black and white polarity. In addition to the stress, that unconscionable small-zoo owner who brazenly threatened to euthanize all of his animals escalated emotions to the point where we are on this path of catastrophizing, because we saw him leap to the blackest possible scenario (in what someone rightly called blackmail) if he didn't get people to donate immediately.
We should know better. Things we didn't think we could withstand a month ago have transpired, and we're still here. I'm in a high-risk category for the virus and planned as of two weeks ago to be isolated for months if necessary. Then, of all things, I contracted a raging dental abscess that was so serious that an endodontist was allowed to open to see me; then, when it was discovered that the infection had destroyed so much bone that I needed not a root canal but an extraction, an oral surgeon was allowed to open up to remove the tooth. I still don't know if the infection is under control or not. Then, yesterday, I broke all three bones in my arm by falling on my elbow. More chance of infection from a huge laceration, more exposure to the virus, more trips out needed to get prescriptions, the need to see an orthopedic surgeon to see if surgery is needed, a trip to get sutures removed, etc... You know what? I'm alive and writing today. I never could have predicted that I would survive a major bone infection or broken bones or many breaks in quarantine that could have exposed me to the virus. We take things one day at a time, because that's all we can do. Yard by yard, life is hard; inch by inch, life's a cinch--or at least less overwhelming. No, we can't solve all the financial problems of every zoo as we opine here, but we can proceed one step at a time, one day at a time, in the direction of survival. People who catastrophize like the small zoo owner create catastrophes--who would now want to give to a zoo run by a man whose only self-proclaimed alternative is to euthanize his animals?
Let's slow down and breathe. Our worry serves no purpose. Only in quiet moments can we find ways to get us through to tomorrow.
People have been reminding me that these things seem to come in three's....