Pretend You Are a Dog

“Here’s why I will be a good person. Because I listen. I cannot speak, so I listen very well. I never interrupt, I never change the course of the conversation with a comment of my own. People, if you pay attention to them, change the direction of one another’s conversations constantly. It’s like having a passenger in your car who suddenly grabs the steering wheel and turns you down a side street. Learn to listen! I beg of you. Pretend you are a dog like me and listen to other people rather than steal their stories.”

– Garth Stein, Racing in the Rain: My Life as a Dog

This dog. THIS dog holds me like putty in his deep brown eyes and snow-crusted whiskers.