There is no right way or wrong way. There is the cowards way which might be the gentler way… Maybe the better way. I could have told her he was still out there trying to find his way home. I watched her weep in the arms of neighbors.

I stood back and let them share that.

She told me, “Losing a pet for a kid is like losing family.”

I remember both. The pet grief lasts days or weeks. The losing family when you’re a kid is a sort of permanent mess.