“The Purest Language Of Love”
He doesn’t know the word loyalty.
Not the way we do.
He has never needed to define it,
never needed to promise it,
never needed to swear
that he will be there.
He simply is.
Eighty-two pounds
of Labrador,
Husky,
Rottweiler—
strength wrapped in fur,
a little stubbornness,
a little mischief,
and somehow,
an enormous heart
that decided long ago
its favorite place in this world
was wherever I happened to be.
And he is only two years old.
Still young enough
to have bursts of chaos in his step,
still learning the edges of the world,
still growing into the weight
of the love he already gives so freely.
I move,
he moves.
From room to room,
through ordinary afternoons
that neither of us realizes
will someday become memories.
I sit,
and before long
there is the familiar weight
of him beside me,
close enough to remind me
that solitude and loneliness
are two very different things.
And when I come home—
there he is.
Waiting.
That tail,
that excitement,
those ridiculous, wonderful
“puppy hugs”
from a dog
who is still, in so many ways,
a puppy at heart.
He greets me
as though I have returned
from crossing oceans
instead of simply
walking through the door.
Maybe that’s one of the things
dogs understand better than we do:
when someone you love comes home,
celebrate them.
We walk together,
his paws keeping rhythm
beside my footsteps,
two companions traveling roads
that don’t need destinations.
Sometimes I wonder
what he thinks about
as we wander.
The smells?
The squirrels?
The wind?
Or does he simply think,
I’m with him.
Maybe that is enough.
It is for me.
Because he is more
than a dog sleeping beside me,
more than four paws following mine,
more than eighty-two pounds
occupying an unreasonable amount
of couch, bed,
and heart.
He is my shadow
when I move,
my company
when I stop,
my welcome
when I return,
my companion
when the road stretches ahead.
He cannot speak
the words I love you.
Instead,
he follows.
He waits.
He walks beside me.
He lays down close enough
that I can reach him.
He throws himself into those
puppy hugs
like seeing me again
is the greatest thing
that has happened all day.
And perhaps
that is the purest language
love has ever had—
no speeches,
no conditions,
no promises about tomorrow.
Just:
I’m here.
You’re here.
Let’s go together.
My dog.
My companion.
My eighty-two-pound shadow.
My best friend.
And God,
how I love him.
Hundred pound rottweiler!
