Rex, Since Half a Century

Before midnight, I’ll mark fifty years or so since a lady beagle gave birth to a litter of puppies, including one who would be named Rex Canine Beagle (I wasn’t very creative, although I did also have nicknames for him). We adopted him, supposedly about ten weeks old, from the Pennsylvania SPCA, where I was the one who picked him out. He was a tricolor beagle, not very brave, generally rather quiet, although fully capable of baying when circumstances called for it, a rabbit chaser in his younger days, a sad failure as a guard dog, usually eager to make friends with new guests, a hound who loved his dinner, an affectionate pet to the whole family, and specially bonded to me. He was my fur-friend, and I was his favorite human.

It’s hard to find loyal, affectionate, forgiving friends like Rex in the world, unless you adopt a puppy. Besides, Rex had such silken fur. If Rex was exactly ten weeks old when we got him, March twenty-sixth would have been his birthday, so that was the day we celebrated. Some day of the year ought to be the occasion to remember such a nice dog, so I will remember, and hope that a few readers will be moved to imagine my old companion, and perhaps to think of long gone dogs or humans or other creatures whom they have loved.