Longtime dog owner Rheta Grimsley Johnson says she belongs to a “select fraternity that pledges love to a creature whose days are numbered and whose needs are many.”

Fortunately, the coin has a flip side. Dogs, Johnson has found, do most of the work in any relationship.

In her latest book,“The Dogs Buried Over the Bridge,” readers follow Johnson as a starry-eyed newlywed starting a newspaper on Georgia’s exotic St. Simons Island, through stints at other Southern papers large and small, and finally to her writing life in remote, dog-friendly Fishtrap Hollow, the dateline for her syndicated column.

Along the way, readers meet her eccentric neighbors, her three husbands, and, best of all, her dogs. She introduces Monster, “a big galoot of a mutt, the variegated color of a hand-knit sweater a dour aunt might give you for Christmas;” Humphrey, who spent much of one night “patiently lining the stolen shoes up at our back door like a clearance rack at Payless;” Mabel (pronounced May-Belle) the first to be buried “over the bridge” in Johnson’s sad little dog cemetery; and Pogo and Albert, who convinced her that “grief can kill you, whatever your species.”

In Johnson’s world, dogs are metaphors for love, loss and life. Indeed, over the years, she has found it “harder and harder to separate the humans from the dogs. That would be like separating the past from the present, or memory from reality. Why bother anyway? Maybe all we are is an amalgamation of the animals we have loved, the things they have taught us. Certainly we learn more from them than they do from us.”

Come to a fundraising event to benefit the Natchez Adams County Humane Society from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Thursday at Magnolia Hall ,215 S. Pearl St. to hear Johnson read from and sign her latest book.

All are welcome. There is no admission fee. A cash bar and refreshments will be provided.

Johnson has won numerous awards while reporting for UPI, The Commercial Appeal, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and other regional newspapers. Syndicated today by King Features of New York, she lives at Fishtrap Hollow in the Mississippi Hill Country.

Her previous books include “Poor Man’s Provence: Finding Myself in Cajun Louisiana” and “Hank Hung the Moon and Warmed Our Cold, Cold Hearts.”

 

Rosemary Hall is a supporter of the Natchez Adams County Humane Society.