Words and books can get trapped in my mind, like some familiar old song playing over and over in my head. Both kinds of brain freezes are a mixed blessing. Today, it's those pesky words that are haunting me. They were spoken by a dog, and they've been tickling the corners of my unconscious thoughts all night.

Getting up this morning and switching on both the computer and the stereo, I quickly recognize there is no escape from seventeen words penned by another author. The evidence is laying right before me -- in the dog resting on my feet, and the cat who has once again, assumed ownership of my pillow against my allergic will.

"Look at them," the seventeen words whisper. Taunting me further, with the repetitious words as a living reminder, "They are breathing time."

"She had learned in her life, that time lives inside you. You are time, you breathe time."

-- Almondine (a dog character), from The Story of Edward Sawtelle by David Wrobleuski (page 461).

The Story of Edward Sawtelle, a novel by David Wroblewski, was an unexpected birthday gift, given to me by my polar opposite of an adult daughter. I probably would not have picked it out on my own, which I sometimes find is a good thing.

If I had to put it's plot in one sentence -- It's the story of a mute (but not deaf) boy and his kinship with dogs, and it's all about breathing time in unison with nature. That's not what the book reviews will tell you. It's not what Oprah's book selection will tell you -- it's just that one reader (me) says.

Ancestrally, I come from a long line of people who talk to and walk among animals. Some family members are even more attuned and more comfortable with nature, than all of human kind. I'm fairly certain my mom (Ginn Navarre, here on hubpages) and my younger sister, ryanobie(also a hubber) -- sometimes have entire days when they like their dogs a hell of a lot better, than some people.

From the next room, as if I need no other reminder or convincing, I listen to my husband coaxing our elderly beagle to take a morning walk with him. It's a daily dialogue of sweet nothings, their own secret language, one that transcends all common boundaries. There are times, when this bond of elderly man and elderly dog, is the only happiness either of them will accept.

My heart alarm sometimes leaps, when I add the heavy knowledge, that when one of them passes from this life, the other may soon follow, if for no other reason than a broken heart and loneliness.

All of my family members seek the company of animals, carefully and deliberately. I'm a nature and animal lover too, but there's a rare charisma I can't escape or deny. With me, it's different. Animals and wildlife of all kinds, seek me out first, exclusively, and often won't leave me alone. The thought, has not escaped me -- I am an animal magnet.

Here's a domestic example of my animal magnetism -- take Jasmine, who currently is sitting on the back of my office chair, leaning just as hard as she can into the back of my neck. She is not my cat. I would never own a cat. It's not that I don't like them, it's just that I am exceptionally allergic to them as a species.

Jasmine is no ordinary cat. She is what’s known as a tortoiseshell and white (in the UK) or a calico here in the U.S. Anyone who is familiar with them, usually is aware that this coloring (it is not a breed) is most likely a female cat. Moreover, personally, I've never known one who wasn't also not about half crazy. The stereotypical black Halloween cat, has nothing on Jasmine.

She's probably the meanest cat on the planet. Her visits to the vet are greeted with dread by the staff who work there. Her chart is marked with dire warnings"

"Needs to be sedated to do anything! "

"WARNING!!!! She bites!

"BAD CAT!"

Here at home, she streaks and sneaks around, not liking anyone in the house, but me. She cannot abide me being out of her sight. My grandchild has had her since she was a tiny kitten. She has never been abused, but she cannot stand humans in general. She resists all attempts of friendliness, even by those who feed her. Some days she tolerates them, other days she's apt to bite, or attempt to shed them if they come near.

If I shut my bedroom door or the bathroom door, she's on the other side, crying loudly, and using her paw to bang the door non-stop. I leave and she grabs the one and only toy she likes, and bawls loudly until she spies something of mine (usually the very thing I don't want her on) and plops herself down on it until I return.

Upon my return, that same toy comes with the same bawling as she runs to greet me, to let me know how unacceptable my absence as been. Several times a week "her love" means wet washrag compresses on my swollen and itching eyes.

No matter how many times she's been bit and smacked in the face, our elderly dog has drawn a hard line, at the cat's attempts to climb up on the bed with us at night.

Yet, on some of Jasmine's loneliest nights, I must shut her in a bedroom across the house, because she will settle for nothing less than four in a bed. This is a physical impossibility with, one six-foot-five giant of a husband, a beagle, and me. Adding a half insane cat is not happening, on the one-third of a bed that is my designated portion and shared with the dog.

Pliny, the Roman writer and philosopher said it best, "Take one dog to cure your ills." Well, not exactly what he said, but the supposed quote loosely applies to blood pressure. Pliny's old script had more to do with woman suffering from stomach aches, but the same principles apply.

Pet therapy has proven that illnesses like coronary heat disease and high blood pressure make contact between humans and animals a "must." Even children's blood pressure is reduced in the presence of a pet. Maybe the quote should be:

"Take one dog (or cat) and call me in the morning."

All parts of communication, when you think about it, is about touch, sound, and sight, I guess it's another haunting lyric, "Do you listen as well as you hear?" (Another broken record that sticks in my head). I wonder too, do we know what we see when we are dealing with a non-human species?

This morning I stood on the back porch feeding red headed sandhill cranes, when a small bird landed at my feet pecking at the bread crumbs that had fallen from my hand. The cat watched from the window, our beagle glared at the missed meal from the other side of the porch -- as I looked up and watched our neighbors dog, bolt from her to come running to visit me -- the same as most mornings. He cares not for the birds, or the bread -- just wants to talk to me. To the rest of the neighbors, he's the barking and growling terror of the subdivision -- to me, he's just another pussy cat who won't leave me alone.

What can I do but love him back, for unconditionally loving me, even if I never asked him to? Perhaps, that is the secret of my animal magnetism? 

We humans often pride ourselves on the power of touch. It's as much of our human make-up, as all other of our senses, -- yet, it is the one sense, that is so important, it is almost impossible to live without it.

The curlew, has such sensitive touch in it's sensitive nerve endings in the tissue of it's beak, that it lets the bird "feel" the vibrations caused by worms and burrowing insects.

Wouldn't it be something if we humans were so in touch with what's hidden from our sight that we could feel beneath the earth?

For the woodcock, it's all about all-round vision, as they have 360 degree fields of vision. Even cooler, this species, has a sector of binocular vision to the rear.

Can you imagine how different our lives would be if we had the same set of peepers?

This provides them optimim protection from surprise attacking predators, and allows them to continue feeding and nesting on the ground.

Locating sound sources, now there's an area where most humans are lacking -- compared to the rest of living and breathing beings on the planet. The boreal owl, doesn't have this problem. They can actually determine the direction of sounds with an unparalleled accuracy.

Boreal owls can find their prey under woodland debris, or even snow by solely using it’s keen hearing.  I've always wondered, what would it be like to hear like the animals and birds hear?

Boreal owls are fickle in love. While they form couples, love is apparently only one season. Additionally, it takes on many forms, monogamous, polygynous, and even polyandrous.

As someone who wears no line trifocals and still struggles and longs for 20/20 vision, I envy the Kestrel. It has large eyes that are placed right along the front of it's head. This gives them a large field of three-dimensional vision.

Can you imagine what it would be like to have accurate judgement of distance?

I know that other drivers on the road with me, probably wish that were possible. Along with my car, who wouldn't have to worry quite so much about dents and dings when I park. Don't mind me, just wishful thinking.

For the Kestrel, it gives them the hunting ability to dive and accurately snag prey. In case you don’t know it, a kestrel, isn’t a single kind of bird, but a name commonly applied to diverse members of falcons. Unlike other bird predators, they have the ability to hover like a helicopter above intended small animals and lizards. They hunt on the wing, and live life on the wing.

Exactly, what is it to breathe life?

There are some things you don't learn in school. They are more things you just come to know by close and on-going contact with others of not-your-own-kind. In my mind, it's generations of knowledge all co-mingling with every breath of every being on the planet, handed down in the sub-conscious. I have no scientific proof of this, but I live it, like time lives inside each of us. I've long known that all of nature has it's own language, and that it too breathes life all of it's own.