Dear Diary,

"Oh lord please make me the person my dog thinks I am."

Met Will Shortz, crossword guru of the New York Times and IU alum. He has the world's only degree in enigmatology. Shortz explained progression of Times's puzzle sequence — Monday's the easiest and Saturday's the hardest, with Sunday's in between. Wondered if Shortz had pets with names like Esme or Anemone? Did he prefer dogs (typical range of difficulty from Monday-Thursday) or cats (transcends Saturday-ness)? The prayer is from a NYT puzzle he edited a few years back (February 17, 1999) … I was teaching ethics at the time; this line seemed to say it all in 41 letters. Prayer also brought back the face of the dog I see when considering the kind of person I am.

He was a golden/yellow lab cross … we named him Darwin (because we had a beagle). He was the runt of the litter with some sort of imperfections on the skin of his feet. People are funny about choosing dogs; met a woman who had found white hairs on her chocolate lab and worried his lineage was bogus, her bubble burst by quirky genes. Her distress reminded me of words from a dog expert — he warned audience to select a pet wisely, "it's the only time you get to pick a relative."

Back to Darwin … he grew to weigh 110 pounds and if his skin was imperfect, I do not remember. I do remember his hat size … his head was gigantic. He sat straight up in the seat of a car; no head hanging out the window … kept his eyes on the road. Come to think of it, he could have passed for somebody's quirky uncle when seen from that view.

He was a risk-taker with two feet planted in the "What a good dog you are" camp and two in the "What were you thinking?" camp. Once left him in the car to talk to car salesman — he passed the time by eating the interior of husband's BMW, just getting his jaws around the steering wheel when we returned. During a dinner party one night, he stole into the kitchen. Then tried to tiptoe out carrying a rib roast in his mouth. I saw him before anyone else and rescued roast. Then faced the question of whether to heat and serve it — Ms.Manners silent on the issue.

His most stunning act occurred in a sort of Garden of Eden drama, played out in our orchard. At a decisive moment, Darwin opted not for an apple, but for a snake's head. He ended up with a tongue full of viper venom … a trip to the vet saved him and about half of his tongue. If I could ask him one question, it would be about that snake.

Darwin's sidekick, Bruno, was another mixed breed. Looked at from ACROSS, his body said "dachshund" but the DOWN views said "German shepherd." Bruno was a worrier, having been abandoned at the end of our country road. Tried to explain to him that we would not have had him neutered if he had not made the cut, so to speak. But who wouldn't be nervous hanging out with Darwin who managed to develop a drinking problem by eating berries, which fermented in his 23-chamber stomach, rendering him intoxicated hours later, believing he could leap tall buildings. Bruno managed his anxieties quietly by chewing the handles off of paintbrushes.

Darwin did not like anger … one night my husband and I got lost driving somewhere. Darwin was in the back seat … words were exchanged, cross ones at that: who had gotten whom lost? Too much heat for Darwin, who crawled to the front to lie on both of our laps at once, his whimpers full of end-of-the-road-type queries. Drove home and had popcorn, best use of hot air.

I watched a man near campus with a young dog … he was yelling because dog was chewing a Frisbee, not fetching it … he then charged the dog, his words soiling the air. Have to confess I turned up the radio to mask the yelp sure to come, probably failing any dog's ethics of what a good person should do. How I wished Darwin was there to give solace to that pup. And how I wished for a serpent to rise and bite that man's tongue.

I cannot cleanse my head of the red-faced man and the odor of his words. Negative acts sit up straight in memory for a long time. I fight back with a happy image. I see Darwin, late one night, lying with cats draped over his back and tucked into his belly. Darwin and cats were rarely on the same team as he insisted they set him up for trouble. But, now, it was hard to see where feline began and canine ended. Who had brokered this truce? More clues to ponder — courtesy of a grand dog, our beloved enigma, body wrapped round our riddle of cats.