Good Bye Old Trucker
Jack and I were a trucking team for more that a dozen years. We put him down this morning. The vet came to our house. In a small town you build relationships. It is a sad day and I am reflecting back on our lives together in that truck. We were a team. Jack was the nice one. I had one customer tell me that he did not remember me, but he remembered Jack.
Jack was security. He would lay in the driver's seat while I slept. One of Jack's victims was an unfortunate Louisville city cop. Poor cop knocked on Jack's door. It was a nice night and the window was wide open. Jack immediately jumped to his feet stuck his head over the cop's and started barking. That cop was on the other side of his squad car by the time I scrambled out of bed. He talked to me from the other side of his car, and left us alone.
Then there was that mean woman at the scrap paper shipper in Grand Rapids, MI. It had been a bad place. They routinely took hours before they loaded me. They would load drop trailers while I waited. One day Jack and I decided to go play. We took his ball and started to head to an abandoned property adjacent to the paper dealer. That “mean” woman came sprinting out of the building. She grabbed Jack and hugged him. Jack 
was always a ladies dog. The woman asked why I never told her about Jack. I just shrugged my shoulders. She had us back in and get loaded right away. After that she would always get us loaded right away and tell me to go play with Jack and she would just yell when the trailer was loaded.
Or there was the woman who had never seen a dog as beautiful as Jack. She exclaimed that he had the most beautiful coloring she had ever seen. She hugged him and she kissed him. Her coloring was a total match for Jack, and she too was beautiful. I remember sitting on I 294 just south of O' Hare airport. There was a fatal accident ahead of us. We were stuck there for over an hour. Jack made friends with a young woman who led fitness classes for one of the airlines. There was a young man vying for the attention of this young lady. She preferred Jack's company.
With Jack around I never locked my truck. He loved to lay his head on the door with the window open. I would often come out to my truck to see someone there petting Jack. People were constantly taking his picture. They would ask me to take him out of the truck. People loved Jack. Jack loved people. He was the worst swimmer, but he loved to swim. He would be so excited that his butt end would sink while he splashed around. As soon as he got what he was swimming after, usually a ball, he would calm down and swim perfectly.
Jack's life should be celebrated. We can not mourn his passing. When I read the obituary of someone who led a long and good life and just think, that was a life well led. Jack's was a life well led.