One of the ideas that inspired Charles Darwin was selective breeding, the process by which dogs or horses are tailored over generations to excel at, and instinctively perform, a specific task. I was thinking about this today when I took Sam to Prospect Park to run after a tennis ball. Sam will run after a tennis ball with every fiber of his being. I'm pretty sure he doesn't think about why, or whether it's a good idea, or anything else for that matter - when the tennis ball flies, he runs and gets it, and brings it back, and that's all there is to it, and he enjoys the experience so much you can actually tell that a lot of his time in between chasing tennis balls is spent hoping that he's about to do it some more. It's a gift, and he knows it's what he's born to do.

I, on the other hand, have had some major difficulty finding my "purpose in life" - I have no idea what color my parachute is, despite a lot of attention to that question. Sam and I fill out each other's profiles really well - he knows exactly what he likes to do, but he has no opposable thumbs and almost no understanding of mathematics as far as I can tell. I, on the other hand, am a math teacher for crying out loud, and the good lord has blessed me with two thumbs and a tendency towards self-second-guessing. He really likes to be petted and I really like petting him. We both get a lot out of the deal, but I have to admit, I'm very jealous of his keen sense of self.