It's interesting to me how my memory works...
There was this TV show I remembered from my childhood. I had what I thought was a fairly clear memory of the show as I had always liked this particular story. I thought it was an episodic anthology series like "The Twilight Zone" or "The Outer Limits." I remembered that the story had something to do with a man and his dog and going to heaven. I remembered that the man was sitting on a bench in a foggy area with his dog laying at his feet, and another man came by and told him that he would lead him to heaven, but the dog was obviously distrustful of this other man, and when the first man agreed to go, but insisted that he be able to take his dog, the second man indicated that dogs weren't allowed in heaven, so the first man said in effect, if I can't take my dog, I'd rather not be there. The man sitting on the bench in my recollection was an older, run of the mill, city type person - the type you might expect to see in a large office in the 1950's or 1960's. Finally the other man left and then a short time later, yet another man came by and said he was there to lead the man to heaven. The first man said that someone else had already offered to lead him to heaven, but that he wasn't going since he couldn't take his dog. The other man says "of course you can take your dog," so they walk off. Before they all go off screen, the other man pauses for a moment, and a look of realization appears on his face and he indicates that the first other man was the devil taking one last shot to lure the man into hell.
Well, as far as I can tell, I watched that show last night. It was an episode from the old "The Twilight Zone" named "The Hunt."
The interesting thing to me was that I correctly remembered the major point of the story - that the man's loyalty to his dog (and the implication that a dog can sometimes have a better sense about people and things than a person might) saved him from being misled into hell - but I was totally mistaken on the setting and characterization of the main character - an old country/mountain type person who had been out coon hunting with his dog.
Since I was young when I saw it, I guess I got the moral, but placed it in a context that was more familiar to a kid who had lived in the city his whole life and who's family worked in office environments.
After doing some internet seaching to see if there were multiple tellings of the same story using different presentations (as far as I could tell, there were not) I learned that the story was written by Earl Hamner, better known for creating, writing, producing and narrating "The Waltons."
A good summary of the key portion of the story can be found in this article from the University of Cincinnatti Magazine.
Three other sites that portray the story in slightly differing variants (although none correctly attributed) can be found here: 1, 2, 3.
I guess I am sentimental. I enjoyed going back to my childhood memory, even if it was distorted, and I definitely enjoyed reliving the moral and the happy ending.
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Posted by David at August 18, 2007 12:23 AM