Today, I ended a sentence with a preposition. I was mortified. Experiences like this never happened when I was totally immersed in the English Department of the University of Delaware. When I "lived" there, my life was full and heady with intellectual conversation, liberally sprinkled with "five dollar words," obscure metaphor and infamous literary quotations.

This one little preposition started me thinking about the importance of Animal Communications Practice Groups. In order to maintain a pure, positive conversational interaction with our animal companions, uncolored by the human limitations of speech and memory, we need to have regular connections with people who "speak the same language." Not only does the practice group positively reinforce a re-learned skill that is often rife with self-doubt, our little get-togethers remind us of the correct grammar and etiquette underlying effective and earnest animal communications.

• I know I do not always remember to ask if a new animal friend wishes to converse with me, much less thank that animal for the conversation.
• When I am called upon to act as an interspecies counselor, I tend to believe the animal and try to change the behavior of the human, instead of trying to reach an appropriate compromise.
• As my cat Timothy reminds me, humans frequently have ADD when engaging in interspecies communications. Focusing on the animal in the conversation and really listening to them is the whole point of re-learning this amazing skill. Not focusing on the animal is akin to making a long and chatty phone call shortly after your dinner guests arrive.
• Last, but not least, I need to be constantly reminded of the Interspecies Code of Ethics.

We may not always feel the need to conform to the grammar and etiquette of Animal Communications, but, as in all good things, we have to know the rules by heart before we can go about breaking them. For example, when you introduce yourself to someone for the first time, you abide by cultural rules and mores. First impressions are important. After the two of you get acquainted, then you can start and end conversations without the stiff and proper preliminaries and salutations. Relationships start out formal and become comfortable. Relationships with non-humans are no different, and certainly just as important.

Relationships are excellent teaching tools. Animals are our best teachers. Contrary to the media’s popular opinion, Animal Communications is not a parlor game. Most people "learn" how to do it in order to earnestly listen to and better understand their animal companions. I have no doubt that those people who take the time to learn and practice Animal Communications live fuller lives, heady with intellectual conversation, liberally sprinkled with unconditional love, advanced spiritual perspectives of the universe and philosophical insights beyond even Plato’s imagination.