My first pet wasn’t my own pet.  It was my brother’s dog, a beagle named Peanut.  He stayed in a largish pen in the backyard, thanks to the leash laws in our county.  He probably was meant to be a hunting dog, but he didn’t hunt a thing.  His talent was howling, which he would do every time an ambulance would roll by, sirens going.  Perfect pitch.

He had very kind eyes.  A few weeks before he died (he was old before I was born, really) I took him out for a walk and he tried to get away.  He kept walking toward the woods behind our neighborhood, determined as he could be.  Almost didn’t get him back home.  I think he knew.

After that, my parents got me a gerbil.  Named him Jerry.  As in Tom & Jerry.  He’d bite you if you held him, little slices like your finger caught in a stapler. All in all, not that great of a pet, though I like to think he appreciated his little plastic house, his spinning wheel.  He lived longer than a gerbil should, about four years.

Sometime after, my dad put me and mom in the car and we drove after dark.  I didn’t know where.  We didn’t leave the house after dark unless somebody was sick or something was wrong.  

We end up at this house in Fort Oglethorpe, in a neighborhood behind the Krystal and the Pizza Inn. Home to a co-worker of my dad’s.  Walked in the garage and there were all these kittens.  My dad told me to pick one out.  So I did.  I picked this brown and tan and black kitten that wouldn’t stop trembling, even on the way home.  Called him Pepper.  Because of his colors.  And the shaking.  

He was so scared.  He turned out to be a very cantankerous cat, though in all fairness, I was probably not the best cat keeper at that age.  He didn’t like to be petted at all.  I’ve still cat scratches on my hand from him.  He lived a long, long time.  When I went away to college at Berry, he went to live with the manager of my Waldenbooks at her farm.  She used to give me updates on him, but I’ve not heard from her in years.  

I can only assume he was happy.  I hope he still is, somehow.