The Cyberactivist

**NOTE** If you haven't read Laura's post below memorializing Princess, please scroll down and do so before reading this one. It will make much more sense to you that way and mean more to you than if you don't. I wrote this post yesterday morning, but I wanted Laura's to go up first, so I decided to wait and post mine today as a follow-up to hers.--Virgil
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We don't know the number of our tomorrows. That was never made more apparent to me than yesterday afternoon at a little past 4:00 p.m. when I found Princess.

I lost a part of me that I will always miss and remember.

I sit here now with my coffee at 5:00 in the morning after a mostly sleepless night. I hear the first crows of the roosters in their yard on the other side of the flower bed from the kitchen window, and I wonder: Does some part of her still linger to hear them too? I think probably so.

Princess came to me as a part of a package deal, I guess you would call it, during a bitterly cold winter 5 1/2 years and another person ago. She and her "mommy" Laura came to me at a time in my life that was so dark and lonely that I still shudder to remember it.

I am a changed man this morning, and that is partly thanks to her, our best friend, Princess.

She spent the first of my many happy days sharing her life with me, she and Laura both teaching me to feel and love and, yes, finally to cry again. She helped me to find the man in me that was lost as a boy and hidden for many years. I am a much changed and better person this morning, and for that I owe her a huge debt.

It was a long road that we traveled together, filled with good days and some not so good. One of recovery for me. One of quiet unconditional love and sharing for her.

This morning, for the first time in years, we wake and walk our own paths, apart for a time. But only for a time. The day will come when we walk together again, and then it will be forever.

Remember, as you read this remembrance and soul-baring post, that you don't know the number of your tomorrows. None of us do. So make each one as special as you can. You don't know which one is your last.

I love you Princess, my friend, and always will. I thank you for the time and love you shared with me and will cherish your memory always.