Three Legged Dog

Walking up Broadway the other day, I saw a three-legged dog. He was missing his right front leg, which you would think would turn out to be a pretty important limb, but here's the thing: Despite a slight hitch in his gait, he was moving along just fine and seemed to be one perfectly contented animal (to the extent you can discern such things in a dog). It was such a striking reminder how well animals of all kinds can adapt to adversity. This is not my first three-legged dog. That came many years ago and I recall being utterly flummoxed by it. Three legs? I mean how could you expect it to get anywhere at all?! Since then I have seen quite a few such disabled animals. In fact, it becomes easy to just take it for granted that dogs can get by on three legs. But there was something about that dog strutting up Broadway that sort of pulled me up short and reminded me once again how marvelously resilient the things of nature tend to be.