I wish I could love as dogs love, without judgement or demands, without expectations. Dogs love “unconditionally,” in self-help parlance.

We’re dog sitting for a twelve-year-old Golden doodle named Abby while her owners are on vacation. She’s got reddish blond curly hair and shaggy eyebrows that fringe liquid brown eyes that look at me as if I were a goddess. It’s the kind of adoring stare that mothers bestow on newborns or enraptured lovers share.

Abby instinctively mirrors her humans while asking little of  us – a pat on the head, a scoop of kibble, a kind word, a short walk. It’s simple loving Abby.

That kind of love is why people slobber over dogs and talk baby talk to them. That kind of love is what made me make a beeline for Abby. In July, I learned that my friend Dick was taking over caring for Abby because her mistress had had a stroke. I immediately asked if I could help him walk Abby.

“I need some doggie love,” I declared.

I was a frazzled loon the day I met Abby. In April, we had learned that my husband has prostate cancer. Our mutual stress over what treatment option to choose, the one that would have the least dire side effects – they were all horrible – was making me crazy. He and I were brushing past each other in the kitchen without speaking. We were both so keyed up in our opposite ways that we weren’t connecting at all. My husband becomes quieter and more resolute under stress. I become a hyperactive Jack in the Box.

So, I took my vibrating self to meet Dick and Abby. The moment Abby looked at me and snuffled her muzzle into my outstretched palm as if we had known each other forever, I knew this was the love I’d longed for. I bent down next to her ear.

“Oh Abby, what a good doggie, what a sweet girl, what a lovey puppy dog.” I burbled into her shaggy face, and she wagged her large plume of a reddish blond tail. Abby is anything but a puppy, but she has an innocence and sweetness that could melt the cold heart of the Grinch.

I couldn’t keep Abby for myself. My husband and I shared our wildly different stress responses, why not share the love?

“Would you like to go to the dog park and meet Abby?”

“Sure,” he said.

I drove. We could hear the barking even before we opened the car doors, and once we did, it was a cacophony of tones from A minor to F sharp, and of voices from bass (the chocolate-colored hound) to soprano (the teacup poodles, of which there were three). I immediately picked out Abby in the middle of the dog park standing like a gentle giant, taller than the others, and much calmer. A silent statue in her golden radiance.

I pointed. “That’s Abby,” I said.

Abby trotted over. To my surprise she nuzzled up to my husband first, and he bent over to pet her. Then she turned to me.

And so it goes. Abby is bunking with us for twelve days. She stands outside his office door waiting for him, tail wagging. She follows me from room to room. She happily goes for walks with either of us or accepts a dog biscuit from either outstretched palm. Her adoration knows no bounds. When Abby’s around it’s impossible not to smile.

She still catches the ball, wrestles it to the ground, and chews it until it squeaks. She chases her tail, spinning around and around in the living room once the ball rolls under the couch. She stares at our cat Marlowe and when he arches his back and hisses, she quickly retreats to another room. Abby has the Buddhist concept of non-resistance down.

Studies have shown that dogs not only lower our stress they improve mood and can even help with depression and anxiety, according to Psychology Today.

Writer Chrissa Hardy sums it up this way: “Canines are the most unselfish companions on the face of the Earth. It’s never about them, it’s always about you. They never read into anything, they never judge you, and they will never abandon you.”

Abby is teaching me about loving with all my heart. She is patient. She is kind. She’s grateful for everything and she never complains. Abby is the epitome of doggie love. I’m lucky to know her.

A slightly different version of this post appeared in the Rossmoor News.