Our Great Dane is a playful huge brute who lives to play and gallop. Unfortunately he wants to do his galloping around the neighborhood and not in his huge back yard.

No matter how hard we tried to keep the fence up he would push it down with his gigantic paws and climb over it.

He has had his shots and his city tags connected to a giant spiked collar. He was jet black with a splash of white on his chest thus we called him The Beast.

One morning he was out and I walked and walked around the neighborhood trying to catch him to put him back in the yard and in the kennel we had in the back until I could get the fence fixed.

My husband was at work, I worked nights and slept during the day. It was my night off so I didn't have to sleep all day and had gotten up early.

After finally waiting for him to come home on his own since it was impossible to run as fast as he, he did, and I brought him in the house. I initiated the help of a neighbor and after putting up 2 more steel posts and added wire here and there we felt the fence was impenetrable this time so let The Beast out for the test. Not more than 5 minutes later he was up and over and gone again.

My husband came home and worked on the fence some and added more wire, tightened it up. This morning he let The Beast out and he stayed in the yard. When I got up, knowing my husband had fixed the fence and he hadn't gotten out that morning I felt it safe enough to let him out into the big back yard.

I had some errands to run that took no more than an hour. When I pulled up in front of my house the ominous city truck that I recognized as the dog pound truck was sitting there. I got out and the neighbor on the other side of my house said he had called them because The Beast was sitting on his porch. He had taken his dog out in the front yard to chain him up on a short leash. The Beast wanted to play with him but the neighbor thought he wanted to eat him instead so he grabbed the dog's leash and headed inside. The Beast didn't want him to take the dog inside, he wanted to play with him as he did any other dog he came across, grabbing the neighbor by the end of his shorts to hold him back. In doing so he grazed a tooth along his thigh so he called the pound to come and get him off his porch as he was afraid to go back out. He showed her his thigh.

We have other small dogs, some toy size, that he plays with. We even had a chihuahua that he was so careful with he even ran with his legs spread apart to keep from stepping on the little guy. The chihuahua kissed him on the nose and could have easily fit inside his mouth as a chew toy. He licked the cats and carried them around even when they were little kittens. He would place them in my husband's lap while he tried to read the newspaper in the morning.

When he got out one day the streets were lined with cars. People laughing at the awkward black galloping "horse" and wanted to know if they could pet him. I said "yes", knowing he wouldn't hurt a fly but no one could get close enough. I was hoping they could detain him long enough so I could get him inside. He came in when I called him then.

We had to grapple and wrestle with him, the neighbor on the opposite side who said the big dog had never tried to bite him. The Beast didn't growl, snap, or try to bite us as we roughly subdued him and tried to put him in a small dark space where he certainly didn't want to go. The dog weighing as much as a grown man finally gave in and quietly lay down as we closed the iron door behind him.

He is in quarrantined for 10 days although they know he has had his rabies shot and his city license.

Since I was the one who was there, I got the ticket for having a dog running loose and a ticket for having cats running without city tags. Although having their rabies vaccinations and are spayed and neutered. How could you put a collar with a tag on cats that run outside and inside without worrying about them choking i.e. getting the collar caught on a fence while running from dogs etc.. I have never bought a collar for my cats for this reason.

The gentle giant lies in a disease infested cage with other dogs waiting for death or adoption whichever will come first for them. When we get him out next Friday after his harrowing experience all week in the pound, he will have to wear a muzzle and be led by a leash just going  from the back door to the kennel. The door inside cannot be opened, even though a glass storm door remains closed, to let the sunlight in, to prevent anyone from seeing him that might be walking down the sidewalk.

So is the story of a big clown-like gentle giant that just wanted to play but because of his size and the fear of one neighbor has to live his last 8-9 years in seclusion, with no room to play or gallop, just eat and sleep and wait out his final days.