Dear Diary

HE LOVED MASH.

I’m not going to say he loved MASH, but something about this song definitely caught his attention. He sang it every night (my husband and I were MASH fans) until his hearing started to fade. Sometimes the howl was more pronounced, sometimes he ended the song with a woof. He put a spin on it in accordance with his mood, I suppose, but it never failed to make us smile. He never failed to make me smile. I could tell you I miss him but that’s absurd. There is no word in the English language that might fully describe the way I feel his absence in my life. Miss only has four letters. One syllable. Not nearly a large enough word. Miss him. Miss him? I miss Italian food. I miss living on the Gulf coast. I miss being 40. I miss riding a motorcycle behind my husband on glorious Spring days in the Texas Hill Country. But the absence of these things has never brought me the grief I feel right now.

So, if you have a furry friend you profess to love, take a few minutes to play, change his water (and wash the dish – it doesn’t count if you put clean water into a dirty dish), wash his bed, cook a piece of steak and give him half – minus the spices, of course. Have your picture taken with him. I don’t think I have one picture of me holding Jefe. He didn’t like to be held. He was his own dog. But he allowed me to share his space. We were tight, Jefe and me. We still are.

You may get tired of hearing about Jefe. Nah. I was just kidding.