Last week I shared some of my favorite letters from readers sharing stories of their pets. This week I want to continue in that theme.
If you missed last week’s article where I shared more letters from readers; here is the link. Check it out.
Michelle Bailey in Indiana has a twenty-two-month old Yorkie (aww, still a baby!) that she has named Bailey in memory of her husband. After she lost her husband, Michelle bought Bailey as a gift to herself and says that she is her Emotional Support pet. Bailey almost never leaves her side, sleeps with her, cuddles with her, and goes everywhere she goes, even on her travels. Michelle says that she had never cared much for pets, but when she got Bailey, that all changed. She says she found that that “such a little itty bitty thing like that would give (her) the reason to get up in the mornings.”
Speaking of other pets, I’ve heard of cats that have been trained to use a human toilet and even flush it afterwards.
I believe it! Cats are meticulous if not persnickety, and they really, seriously care about being clean! Cats are not all the same, I know, just as dogs are not, but from the most loving ones to the most independent ones, I think there are characteristics that they all have. I have a friend who describes her animals this way: “When I’m gone for a couple of days, my dog runs over and leaps into my arms like he’s been waiting by the door the whole time for me to come back, and I’m sure he has. My cat strolls over to see who it is and looks at me like, ‘Oh, it’s you,’ and goes back to tangling the blind cords or whatever she’s doing.”
The nature of animals –
that’s really a huge subject, as just a few minutes on the internet, probably especially socially media, will demonstrate. Animal behavior never ceases to fascinate us, as animals so often do what seem to us to be human things. They love and care for their young and others in their flock/herd/pride/pack, even sometimes showing what seems to be almost human compassion. I’ve seen photos or videos of animals together, clearly a family in their devotion to each other, animals that don’t belong together, would never be together if it hadn’t just somehow happened, and happened successfully. Makes you believe in the goodness of humankind and animalkind, and the power of love.