BLACKIE LOVE

Slowly, gingerly, she stands, stretching from the tip of her nose to the end of her tail. Her cloudy eyes squint as she steps from her favorite hideout . . . the cool shade of her master's car . . . into the bright late-Spring sunshine. Blackie Love is awake from her third nap of the day and ready to seek out some of her favorite playmates.

Blackie Love is the black cocker spaniel who lives with the Roy Love family in the 200 block of East "A" Street. She has been with them for over fifteen years, and those years of helping to raise the Love children, Don and Wayne, and faithfully serving her masters, Roy and Helen, have taken their toll. She is tired and she is arthritic, but she still has beating inside her somewhat rotund body the heart of a young pup who wants to romp and play.

First on her agenda is to investigate the happy noises she can now barely hear coming from down "A" Street at the home of that new family that moved in just a few weeks ago. The year is 1951 and the children that call themselves "Mayo" are energetic and adventurous. Pat, at age sixteen, is well known to Blackie because she is very good friends with Wayne Love and they visit back and forth often. There is Jim, a "new" teenager at thirteen. He is fun to be with because he always has a group of friends his age around and they feed Blackie the crusts from their baloney sandwiches and pet her soft, black head. There is Sue, who is eight, and the youngest, six-year-old Tim. These two are always creating interesting games and seem to constantly smell like ice cream and cookies. Oh yes. The Mayo Family home is a good place to spend the late morning, before nap number four.

Blackie Love meanders the block west to the Mayo home and finds just what she is hoping for. Wayne and Pat are sitting on the front porch talking, so that is Blackie's first stop. There she receives warm greetings and lots of affectionate strokes, scratches behind her ears, and soft words. Blackie sits there basking in all the gentleness until she feels herself becoming very sleepy again. Time to move on.

Her next stop is at the rock fence wall on the east side of the yard where Jim is sitting with his buddies, J. T. McKinney, Gary Gibson, Wesley McKinney, Don Fisher, and "Buzzy" Rooker. Yes! Just as she hoped! They were all munching on baloney sandwiches and Fritos! And is that really her favorite Orange Whistle pop they're drinking? Oh, what had Blackie done to deserve this stroke of good fortune! Her step quickens a tad and she makes her presence known. True to form, the boys start breaking off bits of their lunch to share with the grateful cocker.

After eating her fill and having a few slurps of the Orange Whistle, she decides to use the last of her energies to find the youngest Mayo children, Sue and Tim. She knows from past experience they are probably sitting under the lilac bushes along the south side of the yard by the fishpond, pretending they're camping out and lost in the woods, complete with emergency provisions such as peanut butter sandwiches and lots of cookies. There they are! Sitting under the bushes in the cool shade, just as she figured. The children's smiles stretch from ear to ear when they see their favorite doggie approaching.

Sue and Tim have a special affection for Blackie because they know they cannot have a pet of their own. Just the Spring before, when the Mayo family lived at 6505 South Peoria in Tulsa, their own black cocker spaniel had died violently of rabies, and Pat, Jim and Momma had to take the painful rabies shots in their stomachs, day after day. After that, it was proclaimed that the Mayo family would never own another dog. So Blackie is now the recipient of all of the animal-love that these children have in their hearts and have no place to put. Lucky Blackie Love! How grateful she is!

Finally, after sharing another lunch with Sue and Tim, Blackie is so full she can hardly carry her round body on her tired old legs. She decides it is time to check on her own family. Blackie's family owns the Love Cleaners on Main Street, just a block south of "A" Street. Blackie knows she always has a permanent place there in the cool of the shop, on a blanket in the corner put there especially for her comfort. That is where she decides to take nap number four.

She waddles out the back gate of the Mayo yard, crosses 2nd Street, and turns toward Main. She makes her way east the half-block to the cleaners, sniffing at interesting things along the way, making her shiny black head available to anyone passing by who might want to drop a quick pat on it, and just enjoys strolling along the familiar path. She walks into the always propped open front door of the cleaning shop and is greeted with love from her lady master. Half-asleep by now, she makes her way to her soft blanket, circles once or twice, and settles down to digest her many lunches, rest her bones, and dream about the people who love her.

Blackie knows that later on in the afternoon, Sue and Tim will be going to Gibson's Grocery, owned by Lynn and Freda Gibson (also good friends of Blackie's). They will pick up the items their Momma has written on a list and then, before leaving the store, will buy a five-cent paper cup of vanilla ice cream to take to Blackie on their way back home. What a delicious treat on a hot day! Blackie drools just thinking about it.

Days blend together and the summer passes with Blackie and the Mayo family growing stronger ties. She anticipates her visit with the Mayos eagerly, and is never disappointed. She knows she is loved and cherished, and even though she is slow, hurts often, and is getting increasingly hard of hearing, she is always welcomed and given all the attention she could possibly desire. But by Summer's end, when the children are in school, Blackie Love is ready for a rest. Her hearing is nearly gone now, and her body is getting more and more weary.

One morning, while resting in her favorite place under her master's car, she doesn't hear the engine start. In the next moment, Blackie Love is not in pain anymore.

But to the children who looked so forward to her daily visits, her soft black body laying next to their legs as they sat on the ground and played, her happy smile as they fed her tidbits, and her soft warm grateful licks, the pain of losing one of their very best friends was slow to heal.

Blackie Love was very special to the Mayo children growing up on "A Street." She will never be forgotten.