I knew this was going to happen, but I never knew when, or how, or where it would happen. Loss is always a tough thing to go through no matter what you lose, but when it is your best friend’s life that you lose, you remember it forever.

My dog was the joy of my life, the meaning of my existence being happy. He had the ability to brighten up a whole room with just a wag of his tail and a lick of his tongue. As I grew older, however, he did too. He couldn’t just stay young and lively forever. I was about 14, and he had plenty more years under his belt than just that, in dog years of course. He was struggling, and I felt absolutely hopeless knowing there was nothing left for me to do that could benefit him in any way shape or form, other than just loving him till the end. He had been holding on to his life by just a single strand of love, of never wanting to let go of our family.

After a while though, the grip he had on that strand started to slip from his grasp. He was in very poor condition and I doubted he would make it through the week. I had never experienced death before, so this was all horribly new to me. I was outside one day mowing the lawn. I was so close to being done. I saw something I had never really seen before when I was cutting the grass; it was my dad walking across the lawn towards me. As he got close I turned down the engine so I could hear him clearly. All he said was “you need to go inside; I don’t think he is going to make it through the rest of the day.” I hopped off and slowly walked inside. I wanted to go faster but my legs simply would not move. I strutted inside and saw my dog lying on a blanket, gasping for air, with my family surrounding him. His face was twisted with pain and he was writhing in agony. I, never feeling this before, dropped to my knees breathlessly. My mom ran into the kitchen to get him a vicodin to ease the pain. The cancer was causing him pain that he felt physically, while we all felt it mentally. You could see the pain in his eyes and all it did was bring fear into ours. The next couple days went by without too much talking. There wasn’t really that much to say though. I often visited where we had buried him. No grass had grown over the spot yet, except there was one dandelion right on top through the dirt. It had been two days and it was already there, it’s just something that makes you wonder. Looking back on it now, as much as I want him in my life again, it could be a good learning experience. I have learned from this have become a better person because of it. I guess all things really do happen for a reason.