ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many of the people and animals who helped me with this book appear in these pages, where I hope my gratitude is evident. A number of others are not mentioned by name, even though their kindness to us and to our pig mattered deeply, and in many cases their recollections importantly informed these pages. These good souls are too numerous to name, but nonetheless I wish to thank them here.

Quite a number of people generously read this manuscript from its very earliest stages, offered encouragement, and made crucial suggestions. I am extremely lucky that some of my favorite writers number among those who agreed to do so: the splendid memoirist Beth Kephart; the poet Howard Nelson; my mentor, Elizabeth Marshall Thomas; the wonderful author Brenda Petersen; and my favorite writer of all time, Howard Mansfield. I am also grateful for the careful eyes and enduring friendship of Selinda Chiquoine, Joel Glick, Rob Matz, and Gretchen Vogel. My literary agent, Sarah Jane Freymann, has been a close friend of mine for many years and, of course, knew Christopher as well. Her advice and encouragement on this project were, as always, essential. I am grateful to my fine editor at Random House, Susanna Porter, who knows the joys of the animal world through her pet snails, beta, and three turtles; and to her talented assistant, Johanna Bowman, whose e-mails are often enlivened with attached pictures of mandrills, red river hogs, or tree kangaroos.

Finally, this book owes much to the efforts of my friend and literary assistant, Kate Cabot. As this project began, she helped me conduct and transcribe a number of interviews. She interviewed Howard for this book, and also compiled archival research for me as part of an independent study project for Prescott College. It is she who titled this book. Thanks to Kate’s excellent work, detailed recollections, and soothing presence here in the painful weeks after our pig’s death, my heart was opened once again to Christopher’s joyous spirit.