father with a new baby, now grown; how she had craved the physical contact, how she had loved to crawl all over me, and how I had loved it in return. However, that kind of bonding occurs at a visceral level, and it’s universal to humans and animals alike. Polaris and Star were being profoundly human and profoundly wild as well. For me, at least in that moment, experiencing that kind of deep common ground with a creature in the wild did not make them more human. It reminded me, instead, that we are all animals, and that is not always a bad thing. Love and affection, loyalty and kindness,
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Polaris and Star mother and daughter nuzzling
