I probably don’t need to tell you that my first impression of Mr. Bowditch wasn’t good.

I thought he was a bad-tempered grouch, and it was no wonder he was living alone; a wife would have killed him or left. But when he looked at the aging German shepherd, I saw something else: love and dismay. You know that saying about being at your wits’ end? Mr. Bowditch’s face said he was there. He must have been in excruciating pain, but right then all he could think about—all that he cared about—was his dog.