Instead of handing him the towels, she came out into the waiting room with a mop and headed across the room. It seems that someone had over-watered a big plant, and she was about to mop up that giant puddle. My husband was horrified as the woman chattered away, saying that puppies pee on the floor all the time. He had been embarrassed about the little five-inch puddle, but now he was even more so.

Of course, when he thought about it, he knew she knew all that water couldn’t have come from his little puppy, but it didn’t change the feeling at the moment. Since then, we’ve laughed at how often we become embarrassed about something that our pets do — as if it were a reflection of us. A total lack of manners in a mature animal we’ve owned for awhile, is, of course, a different matter. But we have to remember that our dogs and horses are not little clones of us.

More than once, I’ve seen a rider get angry with his horse, accusing the horse of trying to make him look bad. If a horse gets upset, his focus is on himself, not on the rider’s public image. Though I will admit, it seems that horses have a knack of keeping us humble.

They say that our horses become a mirror of ourselves, but that proverb has its limitations. I’m friendly and outgoing, and my horse Calvin — well, let’s say he is more like Eeyore in Winnie the Pooh. I’ve learned not to try to impress people with how much my horse appears to love me.

In my storybook world, my horse whinnies and eagerly trots to the gate when he sees me approach, particularly when I’m with important people. But my Calvin does the opposite — he pretends to be invisible, or worse yet, he treats me as if I’m invisible. Despite my having trained him to come on cue, when other people are present, I have to be within 30 feet for him to amble over to me, however reluctantly. 

So I’ve learned that puppies will be puppies, and horses will be horses — even the ones you love. That’s why you pack carrots, so you can munch on them while you cool off.