How I knew:

I had cooked a steak the day before on the barbecue.  I thought I'd have some of the leftovers for lunch.  So I pulled it out of the fridge and  sliced off some pieces.  And then thought what the hey, there's not that much left, I might as well give it to  Missy.  I chopped the remaining chunks into bite size pieces and dropped it in her bowl.

It was about a minute later.  I was now sitting at the kitchen table eating the steak strips.  And I suddenly just knew.  Not because of what was there, but because of what was not there - Missy.  She wasn't at my feet trying to con more out of me.  She always did that - probably because she was always successful.

I got up and looked in her bowl.  The steak chunks were still there.  My heart sank.  I wanted to crumple on my knees.  But I didn't.  Not yet.  I knew she was getting so slow and tired the last few weeks.  But I held out hope.

I slowly walked from room to room.  The Living Room.  The Dining Room.  The Family Room.

"Missy, here Missy, come here."

I knew where I was heading.  My bedroom.  That's where she would be .  That's where she always went to feel safe, like when it was thundering outside or she could hear the loud bang of fireworks.  

I was right.  I found her at the foot of my bed, her tongue hanging out, still as could be.  That's when I allowed my knees to go.

14 years.  

She had been the last of the litter to be adopted.  Her hind legs were shaped funny.  She would never be a show dog they told me.  I didn't care.  It was love at first sight, her and me.

Tears running down my face, my head filled with past visions.

There was that time she drove to Florida  with me.  Poor thing, listening to me sing Elvis the whole way, her favorite was  "Blue Suede Paws".

There was the time when she was 4.  She chased a frisbee out to the road and was hit by a car.  I sat up with her all that night.  I was in no way religious, but I prayed and prayed for her to be all right.  By the way, thank you God.

14 years.  And now she was gone.

Have you ever seen a 43 year old man cry?  I mean like really cry, shamelessly howling like the world was ending.  That's what I did.  I sat on the floor at the foot of my bed for an hour, too weak to stand, running my fingers through her fur.

My world had ended.

When I was in Grade School I remember we had to pay money to go on field trips.  I don't recall the exact amounts, but I think it was about $5 or so to cover the cost of admission to the planetarium or zoo or whatever the destination was.  Being fairly poor and having many brothers and sisters, my parents never could come up with the money.  So on field trip days, all the kids would get on the buses and drive off while I had to sit alone in the school library all day.  More than anything else, this made me feel so inferior to the other kids.  

That was 30 years ago.  I look at it now and wonder why one of those other parents couldn't have helped me out a little and paid my fare.  It wasn't just about the zoo at that point.  It was about saving one kid's dignity and self esteem.

Earlier this year my daughter told me one of her friends wasn't able to participate in the art and music classes at the Junior High School because all students were required to pay a $75 school activity fee, something the girl's family never paid.  I don't know for certain why they never paid, but I can guess.

Didn't matter though, some anonymous stranger paid the fee for the girl and for two other kids he had never met just so they could fit in....

- Mr. Anonymous, who remembers that awful feeling so well.

My fanatasy:

I want to tell my wife she is going out for a hot night. I would ask her to put on her $3700 Dolce & Gabana red satin dress, her $200 Dior black silk thong, her $500 Hermes flowered scarf, her $600 Jimmy Cho black pumps, her $4,000 Tiffany tennis bracelet, her $19,000 Choppard watch.

Then I'd liked to douse her in gasoline and set her on fire.

There's your "hot" night you freeloading money grubbing bitch.

Even though I was an infant at the time, it still kind of disturbs me to think that I sucked on my mother's tits.

There is this thing you can do with a Land O' Lakes butter package where if you fold it just right, it looks the the Indian Woman's knees are actually these huge breasts.  Can you believe I would jerk off to that as a kid!

I honk my horn whenever I drive past my old girlfriend's house.  Her family moved away about 10 years ago.  I'll bet the new residents are confused.  They wave at me sometimes.

I'm weird.

When I plant my garden, it is of absolute importance that I don't kill any of the seedings.  In April I plant lines of seeds.  And by May, when the sprouts come up, most everyone would cull out the excess, leaving a plant once every 6 inches or so and tossing the rest away.  But not me.  I can't stand killing off the innocent seedlings.  Who am I, some kind of God?

So I carefully extract each seedlings and transplant it somewhere else.  I actually get a little sad if I mess up and accidentally snap one in half.

On the flip side, I've had 2 abortions and couldn't give a damn.