Junior was the daughter of Arizona, a female foxhound, and Rocket, a male labrador. She weighed about 90 pounds and had distinctive white markings on her face and chest, but otherwise by instinct and conformation, she was "mostly" Labradorian. She lived at Hollywood Beach for many years. Initially she lived with a young couple who resided in an old beach house; Junior and her mother would sit on the embankment of sand near the back of the beach house and watch the parade of humans go by daily. Sometimes the dogs would race down toward the water's edge and run alongside some jogger. I was joined often by the mother and daughter canines and looked forward to their company. Once the jog was over, the dogs returned to their vantage point at their owner's beach house, settling down on their sandy rise until the next lucky human was selected to be their "running mate." One day, the young couple moved. Arizona moved to Thousand Oaks with her female owner, and Junior was moved to the young man's grandmother's house, over the bridge and away from the beach. Junior would not, however, be separated from her beach. She would return across the bridge and back to her Hollywood Beach neighborhood daily. She was well-liked and fed by a variety of people, including me. One day the infamous "paddy wagon" that collected errant dogs, chased her down, put a loop around her neck and dragged her away, to the horror of several bystanders, including my mother. The owner did not come for her at the pound, so I took possession of her, and thereby gained one of the sweetest and dearest four-legged friends to ever roam the sands of Hollywood Beach, (where by the way, Rudolph Valentino once road his steed during the filming of "The Sheik" in the 1920's. But that is another story.) Junior carved out a niche for herself in her new home. Daily, she would run with me for many miles along the rock-strewn beach. She required rocks to be thrown so that she could perform her instinctive retrieval abilities; hardly a day would go by without Junior fetching a rock on the beach. She was a rock hound to the core. She would retain the rock in her mouth until entering the living room of her home, at which time she would let it plop to the carpet with residual slobber and sand included. When she wasn't looking, the dropped rock would be pitched out the window where a little pile of rocks, a cairn if you will, began to form. Out of the blue, Junior got sick one day. It was all very quick. I carried the 90 pound dog to my minivan and drove to the vet hospital where a decision was made. It was time to say goodbye. I cried and cried unlike ever before. Junior's rockpile is still just outside the window these decades later, bearing witness to Junior's once having lived at Hollywood Beach. What a life! What a dog!