"Oh, by the way, I have a surprise for you," my wife informed me.

"What kind of surprise?"

"We have a new addition to our family."

Bubba was a cute little bundle with tannish brown hair, short legs, a thick round body, and soft, sensitive brown eyes. He was adopted into our family at 6 months of age, thrust upon us by our vet, Dr. S., as a birthday present for my wife.

That fact that my wife's birthday was nine months away, or three months previous, whichever way you wanted to consider it, was slightly relevant. If she didn't accept this "present", Dr. S. probably would have begged her to take Bubba, just as he unsuccessfully begged his previous seven patients to take him (we found out later), just as Bubba's previous owner, Billy Joe Vetters, successfully begged Dr. S. to take him.

Billy Joe Vetters was out of work and riding hard times. While he couldn't afford to take care of Bubba, he didn't want to bring him to the Humane Society either. The Humane Society would have put Bubba to sleep if he wasn't adopted quickly. Bubba contained at least five different breeds, not a good character trait for adoption.

"What kind of name is Bubba?" I asked my wife.

"It's a down home, good ol' boy, all-American, red-neck name."

He had the face of a blood hound, the jaws of a pit bull, the ears of a spaniel, the body of a German Shepherd, and the legs of a dachshund. To watch Bubba run was like seeing a big hot dog wiggle and wobble on top of churning little legs.

Bubba never spent one day inside our house, nor one day tied up or restrained on a leash. He was a low maintenance, easy going, outside dog, who preferred the company of our horses. He slept in the pasture with them, and chased after their tails when they got frisky. He didn't wander or stray - there was enough life around him

Whenever I got lonesome for a dog, I stepped outside and called:

"BUBBA!"

One call was enough. There would be a stirring somewhere, perhaps from the tall grass in the horse pasture, or from under the shed, or out in the barn, or under one of the cars. I would hear the metallic clanking of the tags on his collar, as he shook the sleep from his body, and then Bubba would come running on his little legs.

He would sit in front of me and wait. I would pet his head and call him "Goopy", my second name for him, because he had this big, goopy, laid-back smile on his face. Then he would lie down on his back and plead with me to rub his belly. This would be our ritual if I had no snack or treat for him.

I'm not sure if the belly rub, or a doggy bag from Outback Steakhouse was his preference, because Bubba had a great passion for eating - he might have been a mutt, but he was a thoroughbred glutton.

Each morning, after he licked his food bowl clean, he finished what the cats left behind in theirs, then moseyed over to the ducks and nudged them out of the way from their feed. If he was further inclined, he might lick up the horse feed that spilled over the sides of their buckets.

If he was still hungry, which he usually was, he went across the road to the new subdivision where houses were being built. There, the carpenters and electricians to fed him scraps and leftovers from their lunches.

Because of his passion for food, Bubba tended toward the chubby side of the canine spectrum. He wasn't fat, just kinda chunky. There was no reason to be concerned over his extra bulk because he was quite strong and healthy.

While Bubba's eating habits were legendary, his drinking ritual was pure country. When Bubba was thirsty, he merely walked into our pond, sat his hot, chunky butt down, and drank the cool water around him.

The only thing that scared Bubba was lightning and thunder. During some of the vicious electrical storms we get in Florida, he ran over to our house and laid by our back door, whimpering. If he started to howl, my wife went out with an umbrella and comforted him.

Bubba became adventurous in his middle age, around 8 years old, and began chasing cars. He caught a friend's pickup truck by the right front tire, and with his teeth set firmly in the steel belted radials, he was spun around by his jaws, and then run over. He was rewarded for this "catch" with a nasty foot-long gash along his rear leg and thigh, which was opened right to the bone. Fifty three stitches and several hundred dollars later, Bubba healed, although he walked and ran with a slight limp after that.

In his tenth year, Bubba officially became a senior citizen. His face turned a very light tan, almost white, and his eyes looked dimmer. Now almost deaf, it took several blasts of the car horn before he sensed it was good idea to get up out of the driveway. He was sleeping more, and most of his activity centered around lying out in the sun, or rolling over on his back when we walked by, so we could scratch his belly.

By Bubba's eleventh year, he had seen most of his animal friends pass away. His doggy pal, Mikey, went two years previous, a victim of a traffic accident. Buckshot, our brown quarter horse, died shortly after Mikey. Leo, our white paint horse, died of cancer the year after Buckshot. Now that the horse pasture was empty, Bubba went over to be with the cows in their pasture. He didn't look as happy, but he still seemed content.

Last week, at the age of eleven and a half, Bubba stopped eating. His food sat in his bowl, untouched.

"He's probably feasting on leftovers inside trash cans," I surmised.

My wife nodded, but didn't look like she entirely accepted my explanation.

After my son offered Bubba some Chicken McNuggets and fries, and was turned down, we knew something was seriously wrong. We rushed Bubba to the vet.

Dr. S. looked optimistic. Bubba was given antibiotic shots, and intravenous electrolytes. When those didn't work, he was given an expensive blood transfusion. The results were the same: Bubba still wasn't eating. We tried hand feeding him, but after a few days, that wasn't working either.

Bubba became weaker and weaker until he didn't have the will to raise his head. When it became obvious Bubba was going to starve to death, and die painfully, we did the humane thing, and ended his suffering.

This is not my first story about a pet dying, and probably won't be my last. A good pet story almost requires the death of the pet for the bittersweet climax. For some reason, I'm more motivated to write about our pets after they die.

Then I write with tears streaming from my eyes, running down my face, and dripping into the keyboard.

A reader once sent me the following comment, after finishing my story, "Max, the Wonder Dog":

"I liked your story, and I love retrievers, but I'm afraid of getting one for my children. I had a retriever named Goldy when I was a boy, and when she died, I never got over it."

I wrote him back the following:

"Love doesn't come with a lifetime guarantee. A dog can show you, and your children, many of the facets of love while it is with us, and that experience should not be missed."

Bubba was a wonderful dog, special because he was a real doggy kind of dog, with no human habits, as free and easy as God made him. To me, he remained the perfect down-home, good ol' boy, all-American, red-neck dog.

Bubba, it was an honor to have known you, loved you, and looked after you while you were on this earth. I wouldn't have wanted to miss that experience because of how sad I feel now when, out of habit, I call out:

"BUBBA!"

and you don't come running.

THE END