Jobs changed, boyfriends came, boyfriends went. I moved from rural Pennsylvania to Lexington, Ky., then on to Philadelphia. Wendell was my constant. He was stylish: Every morning, when I got dressed for work, Wendell would lie on my bed, paws crossed, scrutinizing my stirrup pants and shoulder pads with a chilly disdain. He was loving: When I came home from work, he would act like I’d returned from a war, scampering in circles and leaping with joy as if to declare YOU’RE BACK! YOU’RE BACK! YOU’REBACKYOU’REBACKYOU’REBACK! He believed in me: Every night, when I’d work on my first novel, he would fall asleep at my feet, his somnolence suggesting that he was in this for the long haul and I should be, too.

I sold my book. Wendell feigned nonchalance, but I have to believe that he enjoyed the upgrade from generic to name-brand kibble. I got engaged. Wendell would start the day by chasing my fiancé down the hallway, back fur bristling, posture declaiming “and don’t come back.” By the end of his life Wendell had a cardiologist and was on a variety of medications, the pills carefully crushed and tucked into bits of paté. He needed a boost to get onto the bed. Still, every night, he would sleep on my pillow, furled like a halo above my head.

When Wendell died, it felt like the world had been knocked off its orbit. When it was, finally, time to get another dog, my daughters were adamant, rejecting puggles and poodles and bat-eared French bulldogs, insisting that we get another dog “just like Wendell.” In 2011, Ratterrierrescue.com brought us Moochie, who had been dumped, pregnant, at a kill shelter, where she’d languished as her pups went off to “forever homes.” Moochie spends most of her life within five feet of my person, heralding my movements by preceding me down the hall or up the stairs, curled up in a padded wicker basket while I work, or on my husband’s legs while he reads, a black-and-white spotted package of pure love.

Our president doesn’t understand any of that. He mocked Vice President Mike Pence for allowing his family to bring their cats, snake and rabbit to Washington, deriding them as “low-class” and “yokels.” Meanwhile, his adult sons are big-game hunters, whose relationship to higher mammals seems to be informed by questions like “Am I allowed to kill it?” and “Can I cut off its tail before I pose for the picture?”

It takes a lot to elicit sympathy for a man whose life goals seem to be deepening America’s divisions, lining his pockets and starting a third world war on Twitter, not necessarily in that order. But it’s hard not to be a little sad for anyone who won’t ever know the singular pleasure of a dog’s companionship.

Mr. Trump may never know the steadying warmth of a dog by his side while he rage-watches cable TV. He won’t know the way a dog’s paw-pads smell like corn chips, or the pleasure at the sight of her paddling her feet, giving little yips and snarls as she chases squirrels in her dreams.