I once had a dog, and his name was Tex. We called him Texie because he never quite lived up to the tough name of Tex. Texie was a wimp! He was scared of hair dryers, he barked at vacuum cleaners, and he paced around the back porch because Molly, our other dog, herded him. Tex was named after the state of Texas because that is where my parents got him. He was a brown and white Border Collie with very pointed ears. Tex loved to play fetch and have you pet him. He was a very loveable dog with a bunch of energy. When we would get home from somewhere, both Molly and Tex heard the garage door open, they would be sitting at the garage door, barking like crazy until we came inside. Then Tex would go find a ball for us to play fetch with him.
One day we noticed that he was running into cabinets, and we thought that maybe he saw a fly that he was chasing it because he loved to do that. What we later found out was that he was blind and that he had cancer.
We took the news really hard because that would mean things would change.  We could not play fetch with him as much as we use to do. No matter how many prayers we sent to God, no matter what we did, he was still not getting better.
On Friday November 12, 2010, My brother and I were getting ready for school just like we would on any other given day. My sister was still asleep though. When I was done getting ready, I had some extra time like 10-15 minutes before I had to be at the bus stop, so I decided to say hi to my mom and see how Tex was doing. When I walked into my parents room my mom was sitting on the ground in tears with Tex next to her. I asked her if everything was alright, but instead of a yes, like I wanted, I got a no. When I asked her why, she told me “It is time to let him go.” When I heard that, I then burst into tears and accidentally woke up my sister and both my brother and my sister came into the room and my brother asked, “What is going on?” When he saw me laying on top of Tex holding him crying, he knew exactly what was going on. By then we had about 5 minutes left before we had to go to the bus, so we said our goodbyes, and my mom emailed all of our teachers at school just to let them know what had happened just in case we needed a little bit of time at one point or another throughout our day.
All throughout the day I just couldn’t stop thinking about him. It was really hard to think about the fact that when I got home, I would only have my other dog Molly. Tex wouldn’t be there to greet us when we walk in. We wouldn’t be able to watch him run through the sprinkler trying to catch the water in his mouth. We wouldn’t be able to watch him bark at the hair dryer or chase the vacuum cleaner.
I saw my brother a few times throughout the day because at Dennis since we got to take class bathroom breaks every once in a while, and we saw each other. I asked my teacher if I could quickly go over and see how he was doing and she let me. I just had to hurry because we had to go to the computer lab. I said okay and I went over and said hi. The moment he saw me, he put his arms out for a hug. I went over and gave him one knowing that he wanted to cry a little. I talked to him and said things like “He is going to be okay now,”, “It’s okay to cry,”, or “It is going to be okay.”  I did what I could to help him a little, but I heard both of our teachers tell us that it was about time to go. I gave him one last hug and told him that we would get through it together as a family and that he was not alone at all. Then we went our separate ways and went back to class knowing that we were going to be able to get through it together as a family.
Now, four years later, we have an amazing mutt named Grady, and he is a great dog. He follows my mom around like crazy. When she isn’t home he sits on the stairs until she does get home, and if I am home he would also come over to the couch if I am on the couch and “ask” to hop up and cuddle with me, and I let him and he puts his head on my leg and cuddles with me. It is the most hilarious thing in the whole wide world. Even though we have Grady, we will always miss both Molly and Tex.