It's a Dog's Life
My dog likes to beg. It’s a relatively new thing, he hasn’t always done this, but as a rescue who has grown far too comfortable, he’s started to demand things in this way (though he’s always been awfully demanding). As I write this, he sits by my side with every ounce of his being soaked in dramatics, all to tell me what he really wants.
The thing about animals is they are just like us. Whether we want to believe it or not, at the end of the day we are, like them, limited by our animal-ness, and the confines of our species’ capabilities. Thanks to technology, we can often pretend that we aren’t this way, or that we’ve transcended the creature that is homo sapien, but even technology and innovation are extensions of our humanness. Our ability to invent, measure, and improve lives using tools is only one facet of human’s capacity to use resources to their advantage. But hey, other animals use tools too.
Years ago, I read a quote from Blythe Baird about her watching her dog while it begs for chocolate. Baird drew parallels between her dog wanting something toxic, and her own wanting.
She says,
“I hope the universe has my best interest in mind like I have my dog’s. When I want something with my whole being, and the universe withholds it from me, I hope the universe thinks to herself: ‘Silly girl. She thinks this is what she wants, but she does not understand how it will hurt.’”
This thought comes and goes, and I reflect on this concept all the time, like I am today. The recognition of the utter lack of full perceptibility is something that both fascinates me and really pisses me off.
Let’s start here: I believe in the dominant benevolence of the universe, despite human’s frequent cruelty. If it were untrue, we wouldn’t have an innate drive for justice, or empathy, or love. If it were untrue, she would give her dog the chocolate, and she wouldn’t think twice. Neither would we.
Now my dog didn’t want anything toxic, he wanted cheese, his favourite snack that I simply cannot give him all the time for a multitude of reasons, all of which I can guarantee he feels are unjust and cruel. Perception.
My dog is a funny one, first because he’s an absolute dick and it’s entirely my fault. But also because in witnessing him or really any animal up close, I anthropomorphize them, I make them human. So, I look at him while he dances around me begging for a single piece of cheese, though he has already had too much, and all I see is myself with roles reversed. I see the side of perceptibility that I still can’t fully see, but I got a glimpse. Like Baird did.
I will never have an answer for why things happen the way they do. This question, like a parasite in my brain was happily hosted by me for years, but I grew tired of it. Things simply happen, and I may never know why I don’t get my chunk of cheese.
We’ve spoken a lot about desire on here. However, I don’t think we’ve really touched on desire and perceptibility, or how we view our lives through the lens of desire, gratification, and suppression. What does it really mean to want the cheese, to get it, to have it withheld, to potentially get the chocolate?
These are important things, first because we already know in our own lives that we want the cheese, and we usually want it now. It is also important because we usually don’t have complete control over what our lives present us with, or how things play out. We beg, not knowing if the cheese will come, despite wanting it, and despite uncertainty. When this is positive, we call it faith. Negative, we call it delusion. I prefer the former.
However, it must be noted that often times we want our cheese, and we never really know if it’s going to be chocolate. Sometimes we get it, and this is found true. Sometimes the cheese is cheese, and we feel gratified in our wanting; satiated by achieving. At least until more cheese comes along. I’m getting wrapped up in the metaphor, but you get the idea.
Where do we draw the line? Well great news, I cannot tell you. This question has no answer and involves forces that no human fully recognizes. Some folks call it fate, or God, or random nothingness. It’s of note that one of human’s greatest points of conflict involves the fabric of the cosmos. Unanswered questions make people feel defensive over their faith because nothing can prove them right. They’ll bare their teeth either way.
We all know what it feels like to be a dog with a bone. Protective, territorial. In dog training circles they call it resource guarding. My dog is a bit of a wimp, so this isn’t an issue, but he’ll be visibly bummed about the loss. It’s important to note that much of what we guard is ephemeral, fleeting; at least in the grand scheme of things. The bone will decompose, the achievements you long for will be replaced by new ones. Nonetheless, we beg, and we defend. I wonder if the universe thinks it’s silly how serious we’ve become.
The point of all this is to say that our lives involve great gaps of knowledge that prevent us from seeing the full picture, and we will use these gaps to torture ourselves with questions. Humans are fickle but this is a constant.
Our interests change, our opportunities for self-judgement and evaluation arise in their own unique and pervasive ways, new cheese, new bone. I wonder why we hold things so tightly even if they aren’t actually there.
I don’t want to lean so much on the withholding of what we want, like Baird suggests, because I have complicated (and therefore not super helpful) thoughts on what that really means in terms of a universe’s intent. I find it hard to believe that things happen within a framework of cosmological objectives, especially with the horrors humanity offers, but often things seem to fall into place. In this way, I feel like fate can hold its own in an argument. But who knows—we certainly aren’t meant to.
So instead, this is all to say that we don’t know why we receive or don’t receive the things we’re after. I should also say that I’m speaking without the necessary nuance of our inequitable human world where real physical, structural, and cultural barriers limit access to most of the world (this part also complicates the logic of divine intent for me). Human free will is notable, in many ways tangible, and entirely lived through. But outside of the confines of the only human world, that’s what I’m referencing.
I’m looking outside of the hierarchies imposed by the human world and peering into the more-than-human world, where we have language barriers with the cosmos, and little is truly universal (besides this truth, I suppose).
So, say there is no guardian of the threshold, no cheese being teased before our eyes by a puppeteer with grand goals, and there is simply cheese and we get it or we don’t. Or we get chocolate, and we wonder what we did to deserve the acquisition of something that hurts us. Neither of which have an answer, and neither of which are worth investigating. The universe is hardly personal, though we frequently make it that way.
I realize this is probably a bit of a buzzkill, but you must remember that I am a ball of optimism, and I’ll contextualize this for you(hopefully).
We know for sure that we don’t know shit, to put it gently. This giant storm cloud of uncertainty is a breeding ground for nihilistic tendencies, and without proper attention, they can fully consume someone. Please note that any opportunity for nihilism is also an avenue for meaning making.
If I don’t know why things happen the way they do (which I don’t), if I look to my past and ask ‘why?’(which I try not to) I can come up with an answer. I can tell myself that the universe is cruel and antagonize the world the same way that my dog did to me when I refused him the cheese.
I can also say that the world has my best interest in mind, that I only receive what is meant for me and what is divinely prescribed. I’ve avoided the chocolate. I’ve been blessed with the cheese. Or I can simply halt the wondering and sit without animated external intent. The best part is we get to choose, and there is no right answer.
In reality, my dog, denied his cheese, will probably never have these thoughts. He’ll be upset about the cheese until the cheese is gone and he’ll eventually move on. We’ll wish he had the perspective to avoid the suffering of that moment of begging. We could try to remind him what cheese does to his stomach (and the 10-foot radius of airspace he’ll infect) but the language barrier makes this impossible. He’ll never know what there is or isn’t to know about the circumstances surrounding his misfortune, or what makes the fortunate moments different. But he won’t need to. He’ll enjoy the cheese when it arrives.