Dogs, doppelgangers and dream assignments

I dreamed that a writer or publisher named Grenier was important to me. An internet search brought me, very quickly, to Roger Grenier, a celebrated editor at Gallimard who also wrote many books. Two days later (there is no cure for a bibliophile, at least none I wish to consider) a copy of his book Les larmes d'Ulysse arrived at my door, It is a treasury of short-form reflections on literature and the treatment of dogs in literature.
    I enjoyed being reminded that Baudelaire said there is paradise for dogs; he was correct. I was moved by Grenier's memories of his walks with his pointer, Ulysses - and then stirred by a moment when Grenier saw a man who appeared to be his doppelganger across the street, and his dog saw and sniffed the same thing.

"Walking along the rue Saint-Dominique, I saw a man on the opposite sidewalk who looked a lot like me, my double. Ulysses noticed him. He too was struck by the resemblance. For a second he pulled at his leash. Then he remembered he was with me. He looked at the double, he looked at me. He was totally bewildered, just as we would be, in the grip of what Freud called 'the uncanny'."

I never regret taking on the research assignments my dreams set for me, or being reminded that dogs are wonderful companions on the roads of many worlds. Best of all, dogs love you no matter what. Maybe his dogs helped Roger Grenier live in creative health to the ripe old age of 98; he died in November 2017.