When I first moved out on on my own, I remember being devastated after my first wolf hybrid destroyed something I loved.  I recall my gentle mother, so quiet and so full of wisdom, saying to me I had to love my animals more than my things.  It is something I have never forgotten.  I can have an immaculate house that is never messed up or I can share it with creatures who have thoughts and minds of their own.  Sometimes they get sick; sometimes they get nervous; sometimes they get bored; sometimes they get rambunctious.  But it made me realize, would I really want to come home to NO one greeting me with affection and unconditional love versus having a perfect house?  No way!  Our house is a home and not a cold, sterile environment.  It is lived in; it is loved.  If someone is uncomfortable with that by all means please do not come over.  But if if I had to choose between the love and loyalty of a four-legged versus a two I think you know which way I would go.  If something has broken and has had to be glued I decree (thanks to my mother) it has “character.”  I would take a home full of character to a house full of sterility ANYday.  My husband has labeled any scratching or shredding in our home “interior decorating” by the cats.  He has been extremely convivial about it despite my abject despondency over our shredded/decimated sheer ‘privacy curtains” by our Bengal cat Elgin (pictured unrepentantly here.)  The French poet, journalist, and novelist Anatole France once said, “Until one has loved an animal a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.”  I absolutely believe that to be true.  And, as much as I value my things, I value my furry family more.