by Angelina Brown

Created on: May 03, 2008   Last Updated: October 31, 2008

His name was Rusty. He was fourteen years old, fat as a stoat, and suffering from epilepsy thanks to an encounter with a lawnmower blade years before. He belonged to a friend of the family, an older man named Newell but called Tubby. He'd gotten Rusty as a pup with the intention of putting the beautiful little dog into the show ring. His mean-spirited ex-wife snuck off and had the pup neutered, ending his show career before it even started. That didn't stop Tub from being hopelessly devoted to the dog. Tub's ex-wife became his ex over that incident and for the next fourteen years, it was Tub and Rusty. Tubby wouldn't go anywhere he couldn't take Rusty. He bought a motor home so he could take Rusty with him when he went on vacation, visiting fishing holes and rivers all over the eastern half of the US for years.

Tubby, never in the best of health, went into the hospital for a coronary bypass, leaving Rusty in our care, my parents being closer to Tubby than his own children. My birthday was the twelfth of November and Rusty's was the fourteenth of November and we were the same age, so it was going to be a double birthday on the thirteenth. I didn't mind sharing my birthday with a dog; he was a pretty cool dog and I loved him.

That morning, a Friday morning, I was getting ready for school, when I heard someone pull into the driveway and then Rusty barking in warning. I came downstairs and saw Gary, Tubby's son, in the living room. He didn't know our phone number; he just knew where we lived. Tubby had passed away.

"What about Rusty?" I asked. "Who's going to take care of him?"

"We'll talk about it after Tub's funeral," my dad told me. "Get ready for school."

We buried Tub on Monday and after the funeral, Gary told my dad that if his family took the dog, he'd just have it put to sleep. It was old and sick and he didn't want to mess with it. Before my father could speak, my mother announced, "We'll take Rusty."

So, Rusty came to live with us. He became my mother's shadow, following her around the house, riding in the car with her, protecting her from the rest of us when she napped. For her part, my mother put Rusty on a diet, dropping him from thirty-four pounds to twenty-two, a remarkable transformation for a Dachshund. With the loss of weight, his epilepsy symptoms all-but disappeared, his arthritis stopped bothering him, and he became an active hound again.

The next summer Rusty and I took to taking long walks along the creek that snaked through the properties around.

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