This is the story of Pickles, my best friend.

Pickles was very patient with me when I was a young child, not minding much if I played too rough, and instead of growling or snapping, would simply grab my hand in her mouth very gently, never even breaking the skin, and look at me as if to say, please don't do that. We played games like balloon ball, where I would toss a balloon to her and she'd snap at it to make it go back to me, or our version of blind mans bluff, where I would close my eyes and feel around the room for her.

Her favorite toy was a stuffed frog that she would grab by it's leg and shake it as we played with her and threw it for her, telling her to "kill it." It was her favorite game. She also liked frisbees, but we had to stop giving her those because she would chew them up and we feared she might swallow the pieces.

When I had a bad day at school she would let me come home and hug her as long as I wanted. Even when I was little I was able to help take care of her, even brushing her, and she didn't make a sound even if I tugged too hard on a knot.

Pickles celebrated Christmas with us, and loved the family get togethers during the holiday. She went on vacation with us and rode in the car right next to me in the backseat. She was sweet and polite to everyone and so pretty cars would even slow down to get a better look at her.

Pickles was a lady and hated to get dirty. When her paws got muddy she would look at them in disgust. She loved to stand in the wind and let it blow her fur back, holding her head up high. She was so beautiful. She loved babies of all kinds, animals or people, and always looked after them as if they were her own.

I was extremely lucky to have such a best friend in my life. She was always there for me. She was there with me to celebrate me graduating junior high, she was there when we got two pet birds for the first time, she was there when I got my first cat ever, a six month old kitten, who I rescued from the same shelter she had come from. Pickles was fine with the birds Izzy and Misty, and was patient with the kitten Whiskers. Even when Whiskers grabbed her tail and pulled, she simply barked at her in a scolding tone, but never tried to hurt her. She even let the parakeets take rides on her back.

Pickles had many loving nicknames. Baby Girl and Princess being the main ones. We found out later that she had been owned by someone else and for some reason she was put up for adoption at the shelter. Her former owners were glad to learn that we gave her such a good home. I have no idea why they gave her up, but I am so glad that we were able to have her.

In the end, Pickles started having accidents in the house, sometimes she would suddenly sit down with a thump, as if her back legs could no longer hold her up. We took her to the vet a few times, and he had trouble diagnosing the problem. Finally we left her there overnight, and my family was going to pick her up the next day.

By now Pickles was very old. Fifteen years old in fact, and I was then nineteen years old, and she had been my life long buddy. A friend slept over that night and we were still visiting the next day when they left to get her. My friend finally went home and I wondered why they were so late. When they finally arrived the back seat was empty, and I was told what happened.

When they arrived at the vet's office they got there the same time the vet did, and could hear Pickles screaming in pain from her hospital cage. The vet looked at her x rays and said that her bones looked like they were literally crumbling. He said he had never seen anything like it and there was nothing he could do. My family decided to put Pickles down and end her suffering.

The vet was very gentle and told them exactly what would happen, step by step. After getting the injection he said Pickles would calm, because the pain would go away, then she would fall asleep, then her heart rate and breathing would slow until it finally stopped.

It happened just as the vet said it would, and my grandmother said after being given the injection Pickles looked at her gratefully, as if saying thank you for ending my pain, before she fell asleep and was finally gone. They said even the vet cried along with them for the loss of such a beautiful and kind faithful friend. He said she must have been in pain even before then, but struggled to last as long as she could, because she loved us so much.

The vet asked them if they would donate her body to their lab to try to find out what happened to her and possibly help other cats and dogs. They agreed, and later we got a special letter thanking us and offering sorrow for our loss. They said they set up a memorial at their lab just for her. Unfortunately even to this day, they never were able to discover what caused her bones to deteriorate that badly. In light of this major pet food recall, I even wonder if it could have been the food. Pickles had bad teeth and had to eat canned food, and for awhile she did eat Mighty Dog, one of the foods now on the recall list. It also could have been some kind of rare Cancer. What makes me sad is that I will probably never know.

I felt terribly guilty for not going with them, for not getting to say goodbye. I had thought they were coming home with her. I comforted myself in the fact that at least I had ridden with her in the backseat to the vet on her last journey, singing to her softly and doing my best to comfort her. The song I had sung to her from the time I was little and saw the movie The Land Before Time, singing the words to the same tune of the song in the movie.

We'll always be, together... We'll always be, friends forever... Go to sleep now, oh rest your head now, I'll be here when you wake...

For a week and longer afterwards I cried off and on, and Whiskers wandered through the house looking for Pickles and looking at me as if to ask where she was. Very gradually the tears went away until I was finally able to look back and smile and laugh at the memories instead of always cry.

There will never be another Pickles. Someday I will meet you at the Rainbow Bridge Baby Girl. I will always miss you and I love you. Nine years have passed, but I have not forgotten you.

I come here to tell you her story, and to tell you that though the pain of losing a pet never leaves, it does get better. I still have Whiskers and now another cat I rescued off the street, Smokey. Someday I hope to get a new dog as well, but nobody will ever replace Pickles. They will have to make their own new place in my heart.

People might ask me, why get pets when it hurts so much to lose them? My answer is, because it hurts even more to not have them in my life at all.

I have put up several pictures of Pickles and me, including the newspaper picture we always kept. I had to resize the pictures to fit the file size allowed, so they might not come out as clear as I would like, but you can truly see how I grew up with this wonderful dog in my life.

- Mandy