Abraham Lincoln said, "I care not for a man's religion whose dog and cat are not the

better for it." Love between the pet and the owner has been immortalized by many a legends. Many novels described the love and trust that an animal and the owner shares. So did many movies. Why even you or me would have had a pet at some point of time in our lives and loved our association with it. It is probably one of the purest relationships to experience for anybody.

We talk to our pets and they listen. They give us unconditional love and await our attention. They amuse us and make us feel good about ourselves. As Samuel Butler famously said, "The great pleasure of a dog is that you may make a fool of yourself with him and not only will he not scold you, but he will make a fool of himself too."

After a hard day's work, the moment your dog runs to you when you are home wipes off the day's fatigue. There are innumerable incidents of where a dog saved his owner or a cat woke up her owner when there was a fire in the house. Do pets have psychic power? They do. They can understand when you are standing at the door or when you are depressed. Pets fill in that void in our lives that no human relationship can fulfill.

Medical research says that seniors who own dogs visit a doctor less than who do not. It is a proven fact that pet owners have lower blood pressure or that the companionship of a pet helps families and people cope with serious illness. Playing with your pet burns up to 250 calories an hour. There are dogs that assist blind people in their daily lives and there are dogs that help police force in their mission to protect people. George Salpiatro, Connecticut lost his vision. He received two-year old Karl, a German shepherd as his assistant dog. As Salpiatro says, "I like to tell people, on January 2, 1995, my opportunity to be equal to others came with four legs and a tail that wags!"

But there would probably be fewer people who would own a pet because of the above mentioned reasons. People who own pets simply love their pets and any and every benefit that they get because of the association is just a byproduct. And it is true that once a pet lover always a pet lover.

When a pet passes on we feel a huge loss that seems incomprehensible. It gets difficult to console the children in the family. Just as a loss of a family member pains us, losing a pet how much ever inevitable it might be seems difficult to cope with. We look for ways to immortalize our lost pet. It is important that we treat the memory of the pet with dignity. That is probably the first step that we can take in our grieving process.