no earthly ships will ever

no earthly ships will ever bring him home again

Billy’s family’s cat died yesterday. Her name was Annie, and she was fourteen, and as far as anyone knew, she was healthy and fine. Apparently she had a tumor that no one knew about. It’s amazing to me how connected people get to their pets. Teddy was the first dog I ever had - I begged my entire childhood away, and spent whatever time I had left at every library in the county, reading every book they had about dogs. (Not the kids’ section books either. The real ones.) People would sign my yearbook “Have a great summer. Get a dog.” After what amounted to years of deliberation, I decided I wanted a Sheltie, and as luck would have it, there was a breeder right outside of Charleston (Illinois, not South Carolina - my hometown.) At this point, I was eleven - and the day we went to visit the breeder’s home was seriously the most important day of my entire life. Once we got there, I sat in a lawn chair, and this four and a half month old puppy jumped up in my lap, put his paws on my shoulders, and began kissing my face. It was love at first sight. For a geeky eleven year-old who’d skipped a grade and therefore didn’t have many friends, this was a HUGE deal. Now, Teddy is eleven and a half. He has such horrible arthritis that he can’t even climb the stairs to our deck anymore. I haven’t seen him since April of 2000, and I’m really worried that I won’t ever see him again. Or, that I’ll see him, and he’ll be so old and it will have been so long since I’ve seen him that he won’t remember me. (Whenever anyone mentions my name at home, he still cries. Even though I haven’t lived at home since summer of 1993, he’s still my dog.) I just miss him like hell, even though I have my own babies to play with now. sigh. I’m so sorry, Bill.