A Good Dog

It's hot out here. I remember it felt like this before, when I was born. When I was still with Mom and my brothers and sisters. The hotness became coldness after a while, but now it's coming back to hotness. I guess that probably has to do with my fur being so long now! Mom's fur was never this long. I wish I could get rid of some of it...but only a little bit! Who knows if the coldness will come back. It smells weird, too. It smells different. I wish I could go back to the big inside. The place I used to live. The place where it never got too cold or too hot and the light never got too bright and the dark never got too dark and the falling water could never get me and there were people. I wish I weren't alone. The big people hurt me sometimes, hitting my back, but it was always my fault. I was being bad. They said so. It hurt, but at least they were always there. I was always there. But now I'm not there. I'm here. I should be...where?

After exploring the outside for a while, I found something that reminded me of the big inside, or a part of it. A big dark blocker, like a bigger kind of the one that kept me from getting out of the grassy part of my old inside. But that part was outside. It was confusing. This new blocker was so big, I could actually slip through it, unlike the old one. It felt more like a home when I got through, like a safer place. It was still hot, and I was getting tired, so I tried to find a place to rest, somewhere out of the way. The heavy heat in my fur forced me to desperately search for shade. I saw a lot of different insides. They were big. New. I saw them from outside, and I thought maybe I could just hide in the shade of a bit, out of everyone's way. Then nobody would get mad at me. But none of them had any shade that I could see, so I kept walking along until I did see shade. A big shade! It looked so cool I just had to trot up and give it a nice laying down on. Even though the ground was really hard, it felt nice to rest. I hope I'm not taking anyone's spot.

Other people live here. I ran when I heard them, but I think they saw me anyway. Maybe they won't care, maybe they won't follow me, maybe they won't be mad I took their shade. No, I shouldn't risk it. Maybe they wouldn't like me either. I'll wait for them to leave before I go back.

I have seen the people a few more times now. They look at me with curious eyes and I think I return the favor, but they have also begun trying to approach me. I don't think they like my being in their shady spot, so I always run away and hide, but after a few darks I saw the male person put a water holder near my spot, filled with cold water. While much appreciated, I thought this was kind of strange, but even stranger was the food holder he brought out a while later. I was happy, but still cautious.

How did this happen? The falling water came. It had been a long while since the last time, so I guess that's why it fell so heavily. So loudly. Living outside taught me to fear and flee from the booms, so as soon as I could, I ran off my spot and into a more secure spot not too far away. I had never been in there before, but I had never been in the outside with so much sky water before either. I was afraid. I was even more afraid when I realized there was a person in there. Before I could do anything, he grabbed me, gently, and before I could do anything else, I was with the two people who had let me take their shade and their water and their food. They looked so happy to see me, but I could not imagine why. I took from them. They wouldn’t stop touching my fur, either…

Well, I got my wish. My fur is gone.

A strange person tried to clean it but ended up just cutting most of it off. So I'm not hot anymore. I'm also not outside anymore. The new big people brought me inside with the coolness. I was afraid at first. They kept getting down and reaching for my head and back, the way the old people did, so I backed away, but the hurt did not come. Instead it felt kind of nice. Really nice, like an itch I never knew I had was being scratched. And then, then they said I was good. I was a good girl. Molly is a good girl. I think I like them. I like it here.

That is the story of how Molly the dog met my family for the first time. Having grown up in a household with no fewer than two faithful hounds at any given time, I've always had a huge soft spot in my heart for these animals. For example, in third grade I got angry with my teacher for reading Where the Red Fern Grows to the class simply because the dogs die at the end. Because of their lack of dogs, zoos never did much for me. This sounds a bit silly, but if I were to cast a Patronus spell from Harry Potter, which is a magical charm that "protects the witch or wizard that summoned it, obeys his or her commands, and fades away shortly after it is no longer required," it would be at the very least a canine of some sort, if not a dog.[1] Going back to Molly, the storm that brought her into our home occurred the night before I came home from Austin. Is this a coincidence? These are just some of the little tangible ways dogs I feel a connection with these loyal creatures. My other dog, Dexter, can always tell when I’m feeling down. Without fail, he’ll always trot up to me and start rubbing his head against my legs, giving me a doggy version of a hug to cheer me up.

 

 No matter how awful a day I'm having, there are no negative vibes a cheerful dog picture cannot remedy.

Thinking about which animal is closest to me, the answer seems clear. If the dog is to be my guide, then I must learn its lessons of faithfulness quickly.

Ask anybody today what trait most strongly embodies the common dog and they will answer with loyalty. Dogs are essentially pop culture shorthand for the idea. Now, ask an especially cynical person what society could use more of and they might provide the same answer. Loyalty to friends, to family, to supporters, to superiors, to oneself and to goodness. I consider myself a loyal person to my friends and family, but I have more trouble keeping true to myself. People, myself included, too easily throw away their own beliefs and ideals for the sake of societal pressures, and thus ignore the emotional struggles of others. I am a quiet person by nature, but I should learn to voice my real thoughts when necessary and not fear speaking my mind. Just recently, I went to a class where the students all simply sat in a circle and spoke of personal hardships. I was so shaken by what some had to say that I could say nothing myself, not even words of comfort. I can only hope to act more like a dog in the future. We could all stand to learn a thing or two from the honesty presented by our canine companions.

Domesticated dogs have also given me some insight into how human society works. One could argue with relative ease that by so strongly identifying with an animal that has remained under the watchful eyes of humanity for virtually its entire existence, I am limiting myself. By denying myself the call of the wild in a spirit animal sense, I am denying myself all the lessons and experiences the more natural side of animals has to offer. One could even say my mind is not undergoing a true spiritual experience because the influence of people is so dominant in the history, the very being, of dogs. To be honest, historical domestication just drew me closer to my spirit animal. “That the lives of these two species became intertwined early on, spanning at least sixty centuries, and have remained so to this day, is … remarkable.”5[2] For almost as long as dogs have existed, they have been bred and raised in controlled environments, their lives entirely under our control. Any that attempt to disobey are punished until the urge passes, and any that break out from under human roofs are treated as nuisances at best and simply killed at worst. In a sense, I am also domesticated. Humans are the products of a system that we crafted ourselves, a system that is only strengthened with each generation that passes through it. This domestication of people encourages us to follow preset paths in society that we have no hope of leaving. This system parallels the world of competitive dog breeding, though it’s obviously less extreme. For each breed of dog in a show, there is an established list of very specific physical traits that comprise the ideal phenotype of a dog. Any deviation from this industry standard is just not acceptable in a showroom environment, and in many cases these seemingly arbitrary differences are deemed outright undesirable for the dog in any context. Things like tail position, or eye color, or whether the ears have that cute little flop in them are all flaws because they are not what society has determined to be acceptable. In the case of Bichons, "A low tail set, a tail carried perpendicularly to the back, or a tail which droops behind is to be severely penalized. A corkscrew tail is a very serious fault. ... Any color [of fur] in excess of 10% of the entire coat of a mature specimen is a fault and should be penalized."[3] These animals are treated as objects to be shown off by their superiors and to be honest, sometimes I feel the same way.

Obviously, humans are not bred for the sole purpose of winning Best in Show (usually), but there are still some obvious parallels in how oppressive so-called standards can skew and constrain human society. Jokes about beauty pageants aside, it's easy to feel trapped by societal (or parental) demands on our futures.

Because of our history with them, dogs are one of the most humanistic species on Earth. Every facet of them has been molded by human hands. I think we can learn a great deal about ourselves simply by observing how we have shaped an entire species to serve as our companions. They are a part of our lives, our culture, and even our language. Why does urban slang allow us to refer to friends as dogs (alternatively, dawgs) without the negative connotations the word used to carry if these creatures have no influence on human spirits? People often joke that a situation or place is going to the dogs, but considering how absurdly loyal and amicable dogs can be, would sending this country to them really make us any worse off than we are now? “There is much [we] have to learn from each other.”[4] If mankind could love fellow humans, all fellows, as much as dogs so earnestly love us, this world would be a much happier place.

 

Word count: 1872

With quotes: 1947

Blog URL: https://courses.utexas.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_1_1

List of Illustrations:

1.       Uh oh, spotted.[5]

2.       This feels funny.[6]

3.       Dogs don’t allow bad days.[7]

4.       Like this one.[8]

5.       For reference, bichons are not objects.[9]

 

 

 

 



[1].  Jerome Bump, "Power Animals: a few examples," Animal Humanities Course Anthology vol. 1 (Austin, Texas: Jerome Bump, 2011), 470.

[2].  Mary Elizabeth Thurston, The Lost History of the Canine Race: Our 15,000-Year Love Affair with Dogs (Kansas City, Missouri: Andrews and McMeel, 1996), 1.

[3].  The American Kennel Club, The Complete Dog Book, 18th Edition (New York, New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1992), 479-480.

 

[4].  Ted Andrews, "Animal Speak," Animal Humanities Course Anthology vol. 1 (Austin, Texas: Jerome Bump, 2011), 462.

[5]Photo taken by me.

 

[6].  Photo taken by me.

[7].  Photo taken by me.

[8].  Photo taken by me.

[9].  Photo taken by me.