Not only does every person we come in contact with have something they can teach us if we are willing to listen, so do animals, especially our pets. The first dog I got as an adult was a Chow Chow named Charlie Brown. I got him when he was 18 months old not knowing that Chow's are considered one-owner dogs who rarely accept a new owner. It took at least six months of patience and some spoiling to get him to accept me. He lived 14 years and toward the end was nearly blind and had severe arthritis. At the time, they hadn't started using Glucosamine for arthritis, so the vet told me to give him an aspirin a day to control the pain. After several months though, the aspirin caused an ulcer and had to be discontinued. When he first got to the point where he could no longer climb the stairs, it hurt his pride to let me carry him, but he gave in when he realized it was the only way. Even in his last few weeks when he could hardly walk and had difficulty seeing where he was going, he would always struggle to get to the far corners of the back yard before taking care of business (Chows hate to poop close to where they live). I guest what I mainly learned from Charlie was to have dignity, no matter what.
    My next dog, Sheena, was a Chow/German Shepard mix. I got her as a pup when Charlie was about six years old. She was devastated when he had to be put to sleep and refused to eat for three days. She was very friendly with Charlie and me, but refused, sometimes violently, to make friends with anyone else. As a result, she was lonely when I traveled. So the main lesson from her was a negative one: don't be unfriendly or you will also be lonely.
    Several months after Charlie died, I got Comet. Comet was a full blooded Samoyed that I got when he was 12 weeks old. The first time I brought him to the vets, they noted a scribble in his shot record that said “heart murmur”.  It turned out he had a bad heart valve that didn't open properly. At first, the Veterinarian Cardiologist was going to do surgery to correct it, but later decided it wasn't serious enough to risk a dangerous surgery with only about a 50 percent success rate. So Comet lived eleven years with this condition which caused him to run out of breath quickly because he was not getting much blood into his lungs. Yet he played, walked, had fun just like any other dog and never complained until the end when his kidneys were failing and weakened muscles made it hard for him to stand and walk. So from Comet, I learned to live life as best as I can no matter what difficulties I may have.