I was in a bad way once (probably should have called an ambulance) and my dog I'd had for 8 years sat right next to my recliner and watched me like a hawk. He put his head in my lap sometimes, but even when I had to push him away because I was nauseous he sat right there and never took his eyes off me.
That's lovely -- dogs are a gift from somewhere nice. Just think -- every canid in the wild could make some human a wonderful pet, but this fact never occurs to either species.
There was once an extremely nice Reader's Digress article on a family that adopted an orphaned fox. Coyotes are beautiful animals -- it's a shame we're enemies withem, but that's how life is.
If our domesticated poochies don't have a good human to love, care, and feed them; they'll soon enough draw on ancient genetic memory and revert to the behavior(s) of their un-domesticated relatives. imo
My life can be measured by the dogs that have lived in my heart and most all of them were strays or rescues. They knew a good deal when they found it and were most grateful for the chance to live on easy street.
I had a neighbor a few years back. She had a Pit Bull bitch that had puppies and wanted me to take one. I turned her down since I could barely take care of myself. ;)