Scout (Diane Webb)

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When I was a little girl my daddy had a bird dog named Scout.  He was one of two family pets.  We loved Scout.  He was abused before my daddy got him so once he began to trust the family he was very loyal.  At the time we lived in a very large city.  In the year 1973 Scout went missing.  We placed ads to no avail.  We road the streets calling his name.  Nothing.  We got our hopes up when a lady answered our ad telling us she found a bird dog wandering around.  We went and it was not Scout.  This dog was not even a full blooded bird dog.  Since no one else claimed him we adopted him but it was not the same as Scout.  In 1974 the family planned to move back to my parent's birth place in another state.  By this time we had already given up hope and moved on in our minds--accepting we would never see Scout again.  Within a couple of weeks of moving, I was out in the front yard with my mother.  I'm not sure who else was there.  Mamma said, "looka there".  I looked up to see Scout loping towards us.  He had come home.  Daddy examined him and says he must have been locked up in a pen with a concrete pad because his feet were slick on the bottom.  We will never know if he escaped, was let go, or was actually dropped back off in our neighbor hood.  Regardless, he had made it home in time to move with us.  We had Scout back after over a year of being gone.  This is one of the reasons I can't watch shows like HOMEWARD BOUND.  They make me cry.