I had a dog onceexactly once.
She was a Toy Collie my single mom took on to color the lives of her
three children, beyond what her minimum-wage job
supplemented by taking in ironingcould do. Her name was Lady, and I'll hope you'll forgive me, Gummy, if I state she was the sweetest, most loyal lump of canine flesh on God's Green Earth, then or now.
In the moment I last saw her alivecollapsed on asphalt, convulsing, the last of her escaping through her paws like the last granules of sand sifting through the neck of an hourglassI recognized the paroxysm of grief I felt wasn't because she was as good, as near as my brother, sister, mothershe was better than all that.
I understand your pain completely, Gummy. I've never gotten close to a dog again.