I had *very* few human playmates as a child.
My ‘friends’ were all animals.
I learned more from them than I ever learned from people.
People think I’m joking when I say I was ‘raised by wolves’.
When my family would not protect me from a ‘bad uncle’, my dogs did.
[and still do]
All of my ‘best character traits’ [such as they are] come from lessons taught me by dogs, most notably, loyalty and devotion.
I’m not sure who’d I be right now, if not for them.
I see my sister [who didn’t like animals] and fear that I may have turned out like her.
I got lucky.
:-*