Mellow

“They call him Mellow Yellow…”

That’s the old Donavan song, but it didn’t work out that way for Mellow, who had the full “Mellow Yellow” name that never got used. He was just Mellow, a beautiful golden Labrador, and he was one of the sweetest dogs ever to walk the face of the earth.

My in-laws gave Mellow to their youngest son Mike as a birthday present, and the two were inseparable for years. He even took his senior school portrait alongside Mellow, which made for a unique photo session, to say the least.

But then Mellow got sick.

Mellow developed cancer in his lower body, which required that one of his legs be amputated. We all felt terrible for him, but Mellow took the whole thing in stride. He became Mellow the three-legged dog, and he was as active, cheerful, and friendly as he’d always been. The problem was that the cancer hadn’t gone away, and it claimed his life about a year after the amputation.

Animals have no pretense and make no attempt to hide their emotions. Dogs who suffer the way Mellow did usually become surly and angry as they struggle to survive. But not Mellow. He remained cheerful to the end – always happy to see you, always eager to play, never consumed by the difficulty of the challenges he faced.

Would that more human beings were able to follow his example.