This month marks two years since our family lost Bandit, our nearly 12-year-old purebred English Setter.

She was an incredible dog and my best friend, and I miss her every day. She was beautiful, sweet, friendly and eager to please. I literally get up every morning thinking about her.

Bandit and I ran thousands of miles together. She accompanied me as I trained for two marathons, and we walked around the Big M nearly every day of our life together. She always slept on the floor on my side of the bed.

When Bandit was 4 years old, we adopted Boogie, a Shih Tzu/ Lhasa Apso cross who was believed to be 3 years old. Even though she was more than twice his size, Bandit let Boogie run the house.

Boogie loves the five people in our immediate family and nobody else. Others have tried to win him over with an offer of a treat. He will take the treat, but as soon as it is gone, he is back to barking and growling to let the visitor know that he or she is not welcome.

Boogie’s job is to protect the family, and he takes his duties as seriously as that mall cop who just cannot get hired onto the police force, even if he is 100 percent all bark and no bite. He firmly believes that he can beat up all three of my neighbor’s Boxers — at the same time.

Those Boxers are lucky that fence separates the two backyards.

When he is not informing visitors to hit the bricks, Boogie is a sweetheart. He loves nothing more than to cuttle up on my lap, and he must be leaning up against me as he sleeps on the bed. By the morning, he usually has me pushed off the side.

Just about every story or column I have written since August of 2016 came with Boogie lying at my feet. He’s there right now.

Three months after we had to put Bandit down, we adopted Sage from Pintler Pets in Anaconda. Sage is a mostly-black Border Collie cross. She is so smart that she makes Bandit look dumb, but she often uses those smarts for mischief.

She does not let Boogie run the house, but she is sweet as can be. Anyone walking by our front yard or delivering a package or mail immediately loves her. I would not trade her or Boogie for a billion dollars.

The beauty of dogs is that we would not have Sage if Bandit did not pass. I would not have had Bandit if Sadie did not die and break my heart. It is like Bandit was a present from Sadie and Sage is a gift from Bandit.

Every dog story breaks your heart in the end, but it only opens it up for a new love from a new dog. If dogs lived forever, most of us would only have one or two in our lifetime. That is just not enough.

George Carlin once said, “Life is a series of dogs,” and nothing could sum my life up more than that great line.

Every dog has its own personality. I have never met a mean Golden Retriever, but every one I ever encountered had a unique personality. You cannot judge a book by its cover, as they say, and you cannot judge a dog by its breed.

For a while after Bandit passed, I thought I needed another English Setter. I figured all English Setters must be just like her.

Then I sat for a friend’s English Setter named Willow, and the dog looked so much like Bandit. Like Bandit, Willow is white with black spots, including a big one over each eye. Like Bandit, Willow is an incredible dog. She is smart and sweet.

But Willow’s personality is nothing like Bandit. Hanging with Willow helped me realize that Bandit wasn’t a great dog solely because of her breed. She was a great dog simply because she was a great dog.

I thought about that last week when I saw where Tom Brady had his Pitbull mix cloned after it died in December of 2023. They used blood from his old pooch, Lua, to create a new dog that looks just like the old one.

But it is not the same dog. Tom Terrific even said the new dog doesn’t have the same personality.

Cloning a dog just seems like such a Tom Brady thing to do. On one hand, I appreciate that he loved his old dog so much that he wanted to duplicate it. On the other, I see a pampered rich guy who is completely tone deaf.

Has he never seen one of those Sarah McLachlan commercials?

There must be thousands of Pitbull mixes in shelters around the country, waiting for someone to give them a forever home. Brady instead decided to waste a bunch of money to play God and try to recreate an animal.

You cannot recreate any animal, and even a personality-devoid goof like Brady would have gotten more satisfaction from adopting a dog from a shelter. I guarantee it.

As much as it was great to have a purebred dog like Bandit, whom I got from a friend who did not have time to give her the attention she needed when she was 14 weeks old, there is nothing better than a shelter dog.

Boogie and Sage were both shelter dogs, and they both show so much appreciation to the life and home we gave them. You see it and feel it with every cuddle and lick of the face.

While Bandit certainly loved her life, Boogie and Sage have seen the other side, and they have never forgotten that. They show that gratitude repeatedly every single day.

If I had Tom Brady’s money, cloning a dog would be the last thing I would do. Plus, as Carlin said, you can always go get another dog to look like your old one. You might even be able to find a dog with a similar personality, and that is a way better option than cloning.

Giving a home to a new dog in need is also a way better way to honor your past pup.

Genetics and personality are two different things. You could clone Tom Brady, and he would probably look exactly like the seven-time Super Bowl champion quarterback, butt chin and all. It wouldn’t, however, mean he would be a good quarterback — especially if he got drafted by the Jets.

A cloned Tom Brady might even have a personality, and he might be a good football announcer, unlike the original copy.

Identical twins share 100 percent of their DNA. Most of us know at least one set of twins where we like one but not the other. That is because each person is his or her own person. Everyone has his or her own personality, and the same goes for dogs.

Brady is not the only celebrity to clone a pet. Barbara Streisand and Paris Hilton also cloned their dogs recently. My bet is Babbs and Paris are more like Brady than those cloned dogs are like their originals.

Hilton and Brady even like to wear the same fur coat, which also highlights the irony of their love for their pets.

So, the next time your best friend breaks your heart by crossing the Rainbow Bridge, do not be like Barbara, Parris or Tom. Save the scientists for important work and head down to the nearest animal shelter to continue the series of dogs.

The new pooch is almost guaranteed to fill your heart with love, even if it doesn’t look exactly like your old best friend.

 — Bill Foley, who would adopt 10,000 dogs if he had Tom Brady’s money, can be reached at foles74@gmail.com. Follow him at twitter.com/Foles74 or Bluesky at @foles74.bsky.social. Listen to him on the ButteCast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.