I have been lucky these past few years. Though Sparky has been gone for many of them and the house we shared together for 20 years was lost in a fire in October 2017, I am grateful to have been able to live in the guest house which survived. Being able to spend time on the property I love, and where we lived together, has been comforting.

When I built the guest house, I had ceramic tiles printed with these comic strips, the size of comic strip panels, placed in the bathroom.

They now greet me every morning, and as I spend the four seconds required to read them, I smile and consider what Sparky would say about Snoopy. Snoopy’s lack of self-awareness about his own self-absorption means that, when he reaches out to his sweetheart with “sweet nothings,” they really are just words. It’s merely play-acting with no emotional content.

Well, I understand Snoopy lives in his own world, and that is ok with me. Most of us do, don’t we? But these strips keep me close to Sparky every day.

I have loved living with these strips so much that I decided to see if I could get similar ones made for the rebuild of my house.

So below, you can see the same strip, but in a different format in my soon-to-be-finished house.

I know I will love being surrounded by Sparky’s creations in my new home as I am at the Schulz Museum. It will be a place of reflection and creativity for which I am extremely grateful.

—Jean Schulz