Have you ever heard people say that dogs look like their owners? I find this to be incredibly true, even though it doesn’t make biological sense. You don’t share any DNA with your dog child, but they still might carry your sensibilities and mannerisms. Or maybe we’re just more likely to choose dogs that already look a little bit like us to begin with. 

Or maybe you just slowly meld into each other until you become one entity because you spend so much time together. Another piece of evidence is that dogs really are our family members. They live with us, they’re dependent on us, and we put them on the family Holiday card. If that doesn’t make you family, I don’t know what does. Rather than children, though, I like to think of dogs as adult figures all their own. Imagine saying, «Mom won’t let me go the party, but I bet if I ask Ollie he would let me go. He’s always wagging his tail agreeably.» Now that’s what I call family dynamics.