I was wondering what pets you have. I have had cats, and fish. I think I SHOULD like neon tetras or angelfish, but in fact my favorite fish was an albino catfish with bulbous eyes that just sat on the bottom of the tank when it wasn't cleaning algae off the sides. It wasn't a beautiful fish, nor did it have grace or charm. It was technically an ugly fish. It had no personality. But I liked it. I have had various kinds of pets (a frog, a cat, an ant farm) and enjoyed each one of them for a while and then tended to forget entirely about them. I have a few inanimate objects I've liked: stones, rocks, books, comic books, but after a while I usually just forget about them but might get attached to a writer that lived long ago or in another country without actually knowing them. I might also get attached to a character in a comic book series (Green Lantern fascinated me when I was a kid). I don't think inanimate objects or pets are a good substitute for people, but someone might fall in love with Black Beauty, I guess, or with the spider in Charlotte's Web. Not me much. I like some people who have been in my life the whole time. I really love my immediate family in which I grew up, my friends from childhood neighborhood, and my nuclear family now, and all (ok, most) of their friends. I also like my wife's family a LOT. Can pets or inanimate objects ever replace people for you? In general I like French speaking people as I like that language quite a bit. Can you name a pet or inanimate object that actually is like a person to you and that you would weep over for a year if they were to be lost, or died? I can't picture this. When the albino catfish died, and floated to the top, I just got another one. It didn't matter a lot. I hadn't even given it a name. Even when cats died on me, I only cared about disposing of it. I hadn't bonded at a tremendously deep level. I do that with people only, and only very few.
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