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I grew up in the country and we lived on a lake, the perfect stomping grounds for a wayward tomboy and her mischievous hound.

In the summer, I used to hop on my bike and race him down any road or trail I came across. He always used to beat me, no matter how hard I pedaled. In the last few years, I�ve had to put the bike away and opt for racing him on foot. He can�t really keep up with me on my bike anymore. In retrospect, I guess wheels were an unfair advantage. Though still, whenever I grab a bike in the garage to move it or wheel it out to throw in the truck, Barney, who rarely if ever barks, gets down on two paws with his butt in the air and lets out a few excited chuffs. And if you think of leaving on a bike without him, even though he can no longer keep up, you�or at least the neighbors and the tree he�s tied to�will hear about it until your return.

Our walks are always punctuated with a walk down to the lake for a drink. If he�s with me, he won�t go into the house until he�s splashed down the few stairs to the shore and lapped up some fresh, spring-fed water.

Most days in the summer, whether it�s cloudy, hot or raining, I walk out on our dock and sit at the end. I dangle my feet in the water and think. It�s peaceful and contemplative and no one ever bothers me. And every time I go out there, without fail, sooner or later I�ll hear the gentle clicks behind me of canine claws meeting weathered wood and I�ll find Barney at my side. He never bothers me, never gets impatient and leaves. He doesn�t pester me to pet him or get bored and agitated. He sits with me, gently sniffing the wind and occasionally nudging me with his head just to let me know he�s there. When I�ve had my fill of the beauty, or of thinking, or of fresh air, I rise, he with me, and retreat to whatever corner suits me.

Barney died this morning, 3,000 miles away from me, and I�m feeling his loss like a vortex that opened with his last breath in northern Michigan, and stretched all of the way to Los Angeles, growing wider with each mile until it reached my heart. I expected sorrow. I didn�t expect this.

I began writing this entry as a little nod toward him when my mother told me that he was ailing. Now, I finish it in tribute to my oldest friend, necessarily referring to him in the past tense. Forgive me my grammatical faux pas and excuse my emotional indulgence.

Barney came to me in the front seat of my mother�s car on an errand to help her bring groceries into the house. I found a small puppy in a big box instead of the eggs and milk I�d been expecting, and my newly 11 year-old self could not have been more thrilled. For a girl who�s birthdays are notoriously horrible, Barney was and is the best gift I�ve ever received. He was kind, and sweet, and strong, and for a breed known to get uglier as they age, Barney remained handsome right up until the end.

The first toy I remember giving him was a pair of Keds that I had outgrown with green and yellow palm trees on them. He eventually graduated to plastic buckets and watering cans. (He was an odd dog.) I remember him running around the yard with a bucket on his head, unable to see where he was prancing and not caring in the least. I never told my mother, but I usually helped him commandeer the watering cans. It greatly amused me, and was probably the height of my adolescent rebellion. Sorry, Mom!

His inside toys usually stayed in and his outside toys out, and he was always really good about differentiating the two. There was an instance a couple of years ago, however, that sticks out. I was inside playing with him with a big rawhide bone when suddenly he picked up the bone and walked to the door, scratching on it, the bone in his jaws. Intrigued, my family who was sitting out on our porch asked me �where does he think he�s going?� as he passed them and turned around the side of the house. I followed him, only to the edge of the house where I could still see him, and proceeded to watch him actually bury the bone next to the house. When I told my family what he�d done, they�d openly scoffed�their theory that Barney had thought of himself as a human and nothing but�shot down in a scattering of dirt.

In the winter, the lake would freeze over and the snow would fall, affording my dog and I the opportunity to play anew. I�d bought him a harness out of a pet supply catalog when I was 12, and when the lake was solid and had a little snow on it, I�d hook up the harness to a plastic green sled and yell �sic �em!� (not exactly �mush!� but who�s counting) and he�d take off. It�s amazing to me now that a dog of his size could have ever pulled me, but he was always a stocky little brute with a strong chest and a mindset eager to please.

Another trick he learned in the winter was to help me dig out holes in giant snow drifts. He�d get right in to see what I was doing, and after a while, all I had to say was �dig it out, Barn!� and he�d get his paws in there and dig away. We usually didn�t get very far before he attacked my gloved hands, but we were always productive for a minute or two.

Though he lived a good life, it was not without tragedy. When I was in high school, my mom picked me up from a volleyball practice to inform me that our next door neighbor had run over my dog with his truck and that he was currently in surgery, having his back hips replaced. It took him a while to fully recover from that, and effectively ended his fledgling but promising hunting career. It did, however, afford him the opportunity later in life, to get his rear end as close to any fire as possible for an extended length of time. We wondered for a while why he did it, but later discovered that all of the metal in his back side heated up and would radiate heat for hours after the fire had gone out. Smart dog.

Barney always got ear infections and was an avid hunter of anything with a smell. He had short little legs and enormous paws and had once defended me against a golden retriever with an arm-biting bent. He followed me around the house and missed me when I went off to college and then moved to California�just as I�d missed him, I�d wager. He never judged me, never questioned me, and was always happy in my company. He was a pet, a pillow, and a confidant. He was my staunchest supporter and my oldest friend.

Barney has seen me through over half of my life, quietly (and sometimes not so quietly) beside me. He�s seen me through difficult days and joyful days and has met each one with a gently wagging tail and an expectant look up. He�s walked beside me, run beside me, and sat beside me through all of it.

Now, I�m afraid, I must make the rest of the journey on my own. I do so hesitantly, missing him with each step. I�m not sure what I�ll find along the way, but I�ll endeavor to meet each day just as he did�with my own gentle smile and expectant look up.

Goodbye, old friend. I miss you already.

"In the world which we know, among the different and primitive geniuses that preside over the evolution of the several species, there exists not one, excepting that of the dog, that ever gave a thought to the presence of man."--Maurice Maeterlinck