Isabel

I guess there is something pathetic about saying your dog is your best friend, but I do think that, as to Isabel now and as to Valerie before and pretty much back to my first dog.  Whose name I can't say because he's the answer to about 50 security questions.

But not really a friend, right?  Because a dog's a dog.  We don't know really what they are thinking, whether they are self-conscious, whether what looks like devotion is really a sense of making sure the relationship is strong with the guy who puts kibble in the bowl.

I have pretty much lost all attitudes based on what people are thinking, because I don't know what they are thinking.  I never did; I only thought I did.  Now, I basically try to base my convictions on what people do.  And why not the same with dogs.  I don't know what they think.  I know what they do.

Isabel hangs around me, most of the time.  When there are children or other dogs, she will hang with them, but come back to me when she's called.  She runs after varmints.  She sleeps.  She drags herself across the grass, looks up, rolls over.    She wakes me up in the morning by standing on my chest and licking my nose, once.  When we are out in new territory she sits and looks around, like a sentinel and a guard.

This is not doctorate thesis material.  It's just peaceful and doggy, and also it is doing things - not thinking things - that to me constitute friendship.  So yeah.  She is a friend, a great one.