h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I've been listening to Jewel again. My favorite song is still "I Won't Walk Away."

After listening to it twice (and stopping myself from listening to it a third time), I started thinking about all the things I consider romantic. That song. The scene in Anthem where Gaia declares "If danger threatens, it threatens us as well; if it be death we shall die with you." The scene in a recent Days of Our Lives episode where Bo tells Hope he's there for her throughout her illness.

There's a common denominator in all this: loyalty.

It got me thinking about loyalty and romance. To what extent do I want my partner to be loyal to me? To what extent should I want him to be loyal?

I know I want someone who I feel incredibly visible to, whose values are my values, who I would rather die than be torn away from. And who feels the same about me.

But I don't want my partner to be non-independent, or cloying, or insist he follow my values/thought patterns/behavior patterns at the expense of his own mind.

I wonder where the dividing line is.

I've often wondered how animals feel among people.
One of our three tomcats is a longhaired mop and I'd say he considers me as the one who takes care of his pelt, while my mom is the one who feeds them, but that may be typical human simplification.
Our dog is happiest when the whole family is in one room with her, and come evening makes some determined efforts to gather everyone together, so i suppose we are her pride.

ooops, i meant that to go to the sparrow entry.

i also wonder where the dividing line is.

I've wondered the same thing about animals. I don't have much experience with dogs, though the ones I've met seem, for the most part, to be happier around people.

My cat is very discriminating, I think. She was a stray and lived outside for several months, but after a while she lived mainly on my porch (and followed me home if she saw me somewhere else on the complex I lived at). At the time she was friendly to everybody, because she was hungry. Now that she's no logner homeless and starving, she's shy around people other than me. She runs under the bed when my ex comes to visit and if she dats out into the hallway, she always runs back if she sees a stranger.

I wonder if cats are more predisposed to shyness than dogs--they tend to hide more from strangers.

it's a strange symbiosis, isn't it, all these different animal species round the H. sapiens ape?