Beautiful thought, and most likely true. My father-in-law is big into German Shepards and he had this one called Jay--the brother of my wife's dog, Kelsey--who grew to be almost 120 pounds and he and Lou were like father and son!! My kids loved to go to GrampaPuppies' house and we'd bring Kelsey and it just added to the reunion feeling. Then, one day, Lou and Jay were playing at this park they used to always go to and Lou let him off his leash so he could run around FRee...on the other side of the Park (a football field away), playing on a swing was a little girl about the same age as my daughter. Her dad was right there reading the paper, when all of a sudden, Jay took off towards the swingset at full speed with Lou in full sprint, first yelling commands for Jay to heel and then yellin' for the father to get to his daughter. Father and Jay arrived at the child almost simultaneously and Jay nipped at the girl's heel and barely broke her skin, but Lou put Jay down the next day...hadta kill him inside, but he said he's never been more scair't in his life--and he's an Army vet who's had enemy fire aimed at him--and said he couldn't sleep thinking that possibly his dog could do something similar to his grandkids.
RIP, Jay.
FReegards...MUD
It's easy to forget the animal nature when our pets seem so nearly human in their affection and cognition.
Thousands of years of domestication hasn't bred the wild out of them, nor us, for that matter.
But, that's what makes them, and us, so charming...and dangerous, sometimes.