This photo someone sent me makes me laugh, because Henry and I (I am in hat) are clearly so delighted to be meeting one another, and Henry's owner is just full of 'oh god, my dog is doing it again, I'll just stand here and wait'.
Henry was entirely adorable. He was 9, I think, and had that just grey muzzle starting.
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Having said that, if he was a pet he would need people who don't go out much. He is desperately upset about being left behind. When an ER denied me access with him, and I was too sick to manage to go somewhere else, my fiance took him home and then came back to stay with me, and it took over a week for Hudson to forgive me for the horror of being at home by himself for about 3 hours. He was rather begrudgingly obeying any commands I gave, but other than that he literally wouldn't even look at me most of the time.
My poor pooch is so attached at the hip to me that he doesn't like it when I leave him with even my fiance. I think he worries a lot about whether someone is taking care of me when he's not there to do it. I understand seizure, diabetes, and heart alert dogs are even worse about that than mobility dogs, so I am glad that I do not have one as of yet! When Hudson retires, having a dog who can do heart alerts in addition to mobility work will be on the list of priorities, but very far down the list. The thing I need most is a dog who is intelligent and attentive enough to match my pace, which varies wildly depending on how I'm doing. Oh, and I need the dog to be gentle with me, as I have 2 different conditions that affect my joints, so I injure ridiculously easily. But the pace thing is the harder part, I think. On a bad day, I slowly hobble; on a normal day, I walk a little slower than average; on a good day, I walk quite quickly. Most dogs really only have one pace and if yours varies you're always asking the dog to speed up or slow down. I've been lucky with Hudson, he's unusually adaptable on that point.
When Hudson and I had been partnered for I think about 2 years, I had to go to the ER and they refused to let him in (which is totally illegal). I was in bad enough shape that we couldn't just pack me up and go to the other side of the city. My fiance held on to Hudson and went outside the ER waiting room, but the security guard followed him and kept harassing him. My fiance finally took Hudson home, and came back to the ER. Hudson was home alone about 3 hours. He was SO MAD about it. He wouldn't have anything to do with me for the next 2 weeks. He'd obey commands if I gave them, but otherwise he didn't even want to look at me, much less be near me or receive affection from me. It was very upsetting (as if the ER denying me access to my dog wasn't bad enough).