No Repeat

"He isn’t working out," my client informed me as we sat observing her new puppy. "This dog LOOKS like my Pete as a pup," she continued, "but it just doesn't feel right."
A small Beagle with a friendly, confident attitude, the 13 week old as-yet-nameless puppy had made himself at home, busily sniffing about and taking in the smells of tracks laid by the other dogs who frequent the room.
Claire, widowed and in her late sixties, lived alone with Pete after her husband passed away six years ago. The dog had been, by Claire's admission, her "reason for living."  When Claire lost Pete to congestive heart failure three months ago, her two adult children worried about their mother being alone. They surprised her with the little Pete look-alike in hopes of helping her regain some of the joy and companionship she had shared with her previous pet.
"They meant well," offered Claire; "I just know it isn't Pete." She suddenly stated, "I'm having him cloned."
I stared blankly at the woman.
"Pete--the REAL Pete--I'm having him cloned," Claire informed me.
"Oh," I replied, shocked to say the least. "I didn't think you could, um, have that done...yet."
Claire explained that she had had some of Pete's living tissue preserved so that when the option of cloning was made available to the public, her dog would be able to be born again. A rather modern perspective, to say the least, and I was completely taken aback. Recovering from my shock, I realized Claire's concept of cloning was more fiction than science, and the hope she was clinging to was based on incorrect perception.

In actuality, the ground work has been done and the options of pet cloning may soon be reality. A Texas A&M team plans to clone pets, starting with Missiplicity, the beloved canine companion of an anonymous billionaire who is putting up the research funds. Offshoots with names such as "Genetic Savings and Clone (College Station, TX, www.savingsandclone.com) collect and store DNA indefinitely from pets (but not from people), and even offer gift certificates, though cloning is not yet available. Gene banks typically send a DNA collection kit, which a veterinarian uses to take a small skin sample. The tissue is grown in culture temporarily, then frozen in liquid nitrogen, ready for thawing and cloning for years to come.
What cloning can and cannot do seems misunderstood by some people, as proven by Claire's unrealistic hopes. Cloning isn't reincarnation; when and if it becomes an actual option for pet reproduction, it will be a process that allows the equivalent of an identical twin to be created. The clone will not be the old animal brought back to life in a new body; it will be a completely different animal with identical genetics. A clone is not born into a new, laboratory-grown adult body; it is a new life, started from scratch in-vitro, using cells of its predecessor as "parents" and then implanted into a surrogate parent which carries it to term and gives birth to it. It is in effect a sibling of the source animal, with identical genetic makeup. The clone will have similar character to the source animal, since temperament is certainly influenced by DNA; but social and environmental experiences are equally important building blocks of personality. The original animal may have turned out differently, had it been raised in a different time under different circumstances. A clone will have its own perceptions, and make its own memories.
Ethical questions aside, and there are many, does cloning a pet make sense? Would Claire make a better bond with a Beagle puppy made from Pete, though still "not Pete," rather than the little nameless one in her possession but not in her heart?
In the end, cloning may result in a suitable facsimile; but either way Pete is gone. Focusing only on the future and false hopes of bringing him back, Claire is missing out on an important part of truly loving another life; acknowledging its loss, mourning it, and saying good-bye. Only then, will she be able to love again. Unfortunately, the new puppy seems to have come into her life too soon.
All I can do to help is tell the truth, as disappointing as it seems to be to Claire.
With tears in her eyes, she thanks me. As she picks up the puppy, I wonder what she plans to do with him. I decide to offer to rehome him, but just then Claire says "Let's go, Finnegan" to the puppy nuzzling in the crook of her arm.
I think they will be fine.