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Bryn Durgin and Navied Mahdavian

Op-comic: What do ‘dog years’ measure? Emotional urgency

By Bryn Durgin and Navied MahdavianGuest contributors 
My dog Buddy turns 18 this month. You're officially considered an adult; can buy cigarettes, lottery, start a line of credit.
I was 18 when I got Buddy. I'm 36 now. We've been together for half of my life.
They say a single human year is equivalent to seven dog years. I've doubled Buddy's age. In dog years, he's far surpassed me.
Dog years is less about scientific accuracy and more emotional urgency. It's a way to cope with the brevity of a dog's life.
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Time travels at different speeds. Some years compress. Others stretch out. The stuff of childhood, of grief. Of waiting.
Most of Buddy's life has been spent waiting for me. Every hour of mine is seven of his.
His whole world revolves around me. But now, my life has started revolving around him more and more.
My experience of time will surely change once he's gone.
We say that time "goes by," as if we're not a part of it. Time is something we create.

Bryn Durgin, a writer, is the director of programming at Bookstore1Sarasota. Navied Mahdavian, a cartoonist and writer, is the author of the graphic memoir “This Country: Searching for Home in (Very) Rural America.”

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