I'm staying at my sister's beautiful new home in Albuquerue, New Mexico, recovering from cancer.

I hike several hours a day in the desert ravine below our housing division and have been getting strong enough to do other things as well,.

But mostly I lie in my recliner, edit wildlife photos, watch Netflix, etc. or just sleep because I take a lot of high THC cannabis oil for pain, and it's a cancer cell killer.

I noticed whenever cannabis effects were wearing out, that I felt deep sadness..missing my daughter, my dogs, my pets in Kentucky, etc.

I googled solutions for depression in cancer patients and the main concensus was that pet therapy works well. Just having a friendly pet to cuddle on your lap works wonders.

My sister is allergic to most dog hair, so I spent several weeks googling inexpensive pocket pets, but all of them had fussy care needs..humidity, temperature, etc. or they were noisy, messy, or destructive. Or didn't want to be touched.

But my sister said that I could google a shelter dog and she'd go with me to see it, to see if she reacted to its fur. I was surprised, but we googled some possibilities and finally chose a dog almost identical in appearance to my former Feist terrier, Fergie, so I named her the same.

Fergie was a stray the shelter people rescued, is four years old, 12 pounds, and loves being a couch potato lap dog, getting endless belly rubs (who wouldn't?).

Despite her apparent DNA heritage, she's uninterested in barking or tearing around, preferring to lie around with me in the recliner.

It seems to be a Chihuahua-Jack Russell-Italian Greyhound mix, and, like the Italian Greyhound,her personality is calm, sweet, gentle, yet she can leap effortlessly into the recliner and into other chairs.

Fergie doesn't even like the exercise of walking around the tiny back yard to do her business, and when she does, she has the dainty, precious walk of an Italian Greyhound . But I have no intention of taking her hiking in the desert ravine with me. At 12 pounds she'd make a great snack for some of my more rugged desert pals, who might think I'm finally reciprocating and bringing THEM food, for once.