Words find it very hard to come to my brain and out my mouth of what I'm feeling. But I know for sure it was not the feeling I wanted when I arrived home this morning. Let me paint a picture for you. I came home to my mother crying and my father saying, "We have some bad news." My mother than explained to my that my dog Tyler had been hit by a car and died. I was dumbfounded. I couldn't believe it.
I learned that our gate had been open and Tyler wondered out. But the fact that you couldn't see my dog questions you, and particularly your competence in driving an automobile. To hear that our neighbor had to come to our house and tell us that our dog had been killed makes you not only a terrible inattentive driver who has committed vehicular homicide but a coward. A yellow bellied coward without any class or decency. Right now on your life's movie you are playing the role of the Cowardly Lion.
I didn't expect to come home with a family member dead.
I didn't expect to dig a grave for my dog, and bury him this afternoon.
I didn't expect that the perpetrator would remain in the shadows.
All I hope is that you feel a terrible weight chained to your heart for as long as you stay anonymous, and I hope the guilt keeps you awake when you try to fall asleep to forget that feeling of killing a loved member of my family.
Tyler may have not been my favorite pet I've ever had, but he was a member of our family none the less. There were many things I did not like about him, but the jingle of his collar, the patter of his feet, the tilt of his head when you tell him something, the way he sat up on his rear end, and mostly missed will be his presence.
Dear Grandpa,
Our loss is your gain. Keep him busy while he's waiting, I'm sure Shiloh is more than excited to see him.
love, Stephen
Tyler, December 14th, 1998 to November 3rd, 2007.
