day140 - service animal

in year 9, my girlfriend was agoraphobic. the thought of leaving the house made her so anxious that she would throw up. after a few months of missed classes and promises she could never have been expected to keep, her parents bought her a dog, a robust little mutt with a smiley mouth and short, light brown fur. she named him Dipper. the hope was that Dipper would be a kind of untrained therapy dog who could ease her loneliness and steadily desensitize her to leaving the house. short walks would become longer, and by focusing on Dipper, her anxiety had a harder time getting its claws in. I broke up with her via Skype a month later. it was the closest I could get to delivering the news in person. cats can't legally be qualified service animals in most countries. that exclusion usually comes with no explanation, but a lot of people chalk it up to their nature. they just don't have the temperament, the ability to be trained. cats are too fickle to be service animals— but, most sources…