A Dash For Home

           Los Angeles, in better times for Mog and me, would have offered much.  We were thankful, however, for friends who offered rest and food and then sent us on our way with fair wishes.

           Uncle Ernie looked at the crumbling car with its cloak of mud and road scarred skin and wondered where it would end its life between Sacramento and Portland.

           We went into San Francisco for the day.  The Mog, well, he stayed behind.  It was kind of sad, after nearly 14,000 miles together being left out for the first time.  A pledge was made then and there that some day we would visit this great city together.

           I felt like a World War I pilot as Uncle pushed us off on our final crawl.  It was embarrassing for Mog to be passed on the steep grades of the southern Oregon Siskiyou mountains by those lumbering behemoths as we trudged up the mountain passes slower then a man could run. hoping that the Mog's heart missing its beat badly but still keeping a discordant time, would not yet give his last.

           Nothing could stop us now, though, as urgency was our calling.  As the city lights reflected down from the clouds of Portland, Oregon, a never before myriad of emotions poured into my consciousness:  weariness, elation, sense of accomplishment, sadness, relief.

           Snuggled under warm blankets, I, for the first time in nearly three months, closed my eyes in trouble-free sleep on Christmas Eve.

           Moggy, well he spluttered, and coughed his last breath that night giving his all under my bedroom window.

THE END