Cry Me A River

I’m fixing to cry me a river.

My dog died today. When I went out there in the front yard he was lying in the middle of the driveway like he was just soaking up the sunshine, but when I attempted to rouse him up he was cold and stiff as a board. Yep. He was dead as a hammer.

While I was searching for a shovel I began to think about what a good dog Old Bill had been. He wasn’t a purebred dog. I didn’t even know exactly what kind of mixture he was.

All I knew was that he was some kind of a hound with a coat about the shade of a rusty can, but I also knew his demeanor had always been a warm and friendly shade of companionship.

He had always scared off the intruders with just a bark and kept the destructive critters out of my yard with his vigilant watch. He was a sentinel without rank who took pride in job.
During his life he had been better than some people I knew. Unlike them, he would come when I called him, go away when I asked, and always be there when I needed him.

I remembered all the times when I had been down on my luck and nobody was lonesome for me, yet when I got home, just like always, Old Bill would look up at me with love in his eyes while he licked my hand and wagged his tail.

That was one of the main reasons I liked him so much, because unlike people, he wagged his tail and not his tongue. I even remembered way back when I found him abandoned beside the road.
Through the years Old Bill had enlightened me with the fact that if you help out a starving dog he will not bite you, unlike some of my human counterparts.

I had my shovel now, and I found a nice spot underneath a big catawba tree. The spot seemed only fitting, since he had loved to go fishing with me in the spring when I picked those big fat worms off the leaves of that tree and used them to catch a mess of bluegills.

The job was finished and I didn’t know anything else to do. But I did know I was fixing to try to be as good a person as Old Bill had thought I was.