I brought him home, of course He can join some old friends under the locust in the upper part of the garden: Fergus, Tigger and Piddy-Pat - all the cats that used to sleep with him. Now, they can sleep together again.

I found Teddie in a dumpster in 1988. Somebody had put him out with the trash. They had also beaten the hell out of him, and he spent several weeks behind the couch in my living room. The vet who treated him estimated his age at three of four, and noted that he would probably always be a little nervous around strangers. He was a small dog, black and tan, (a kind of degenerate Benji of movie fame) wire-haired, with short legs, perky ears and an ingratiating grin - the latter being a toothy affair that always puzzled people. "Where did he learn to do that?" they would say. I haven't any idea, but he used it like a flag of truce on everyone. "I come in peace," he seemed to say. Then, he would roll over on his back and grin some more.

For a while, he was not sure he wanted to stay with me I was definitely weird, and when we went to town, he became alarmed when I blew the horn, made obscene gestures at other motorists and cursed loudly. Besides, the world was a big place, and although someone had bobbed his tail, he had not been altered. I think Teddie wanted to be a lover. During the first year, I came home most afternoons, to find that he was gone - visiting a huge Dalmatian up in the cove. It was a doomed love affair. I always found him staring adoringly at the big dog and grinning. After a month, I had him "fixed" and within a few days, he had become meditative and thoughtful, more interested in intellectual pursuits than carnal affairs. Eventually, he began traveling with me on the storytelling circuit. I placed two large cushions on his seat so he could see out, and he became addicted to hanging out the window. (He once fell out in Highlands, rolling into an autumn ditch filled with leaves.)

I know it is foolish to say so, but I never had a better friend. When he decided to cast his lot with me his devotion was total and unconditional. For twelve years he slept with me, attended storytelling sessions in Georgia and Tennessee, and had his picture made by hundreds of folks. He usually slept at my feet when I taught, rousing himself to bark when I reached a punch line. He announced visitors on my porch with long yodeling barks (a definite help since I am deaf) and he loved TV. I used to watch the movie "Blue" just to see him attack my speakers when a nest of baby rats began squeaking in one scene. He also howled accompaniment when I played Gregorian chants or the Andrews sisters. on my huge stereo. (Well, when you are deaf, they have to be huge!) He was given to attacking large dogs who came into my yard, but he was fortunate in that they always seemed to have a sense of humor. Each morning, he did a survey of his kingdom, from house to barn to garden, checking for rats and possums and dangerous robins.