AMARILLO, Texas — It took me a few hours today to realize what was different about this brief excursion from my North Texas home to points northwest on the Texas Caprock.
I was alone in the pickup. By that I mean I was totally alone.
Now, you know that my dear bride, Kathy Anne, is gone. It’s obvious to you that she is unable to accompany me alongside in her customary place in the vehicle we own.
What isn’t obvious is that Toby the Puppy didn’t make this trip. He stayed home to keep my son and his two kitties, Macy and Marlowe, company.
I ventured back to the High Plains to see a few friends. Not many of them, mind you, because I’m here only for a couple of days before I head back to the house in Princeton.
But damn! Not having my puppy with me is seriously strange, man. I talk to him while we motor along the highway. He doesn’t talk back, obviously. He does respond with a tail wag and a lick. He will let me know if he has to relieve himself along the way; he gives me the doe-eyed stare and he might start to paw my arm, as if to say, “Dad, uhhh, it’s time to pull over.”
But for the first time in, oh, a very long time I have no traveling companion to share a laugh or to say, “I love you.” Yes, I tell Toby the Puppy that I love him all the time, just as I told Kathy Anne that very truth for more than 50 years.
She would say she loved me, too. Toby the Puppy? He expresses his love differently, but I know it when he tells me.
I’m glad I’ll be away only for two nights. Then I head home. The next sojourn commences in a couple of weeks; it will take me east to North Carolina and Virginia and points between here and there.
Toby the Puppy will be with me for every mile of that trek.