Of Dogs and Fifth Graders
To Pfabe,
I am writing this for you, because you might well love dogs more than anyone else I know. Maybe even more than Josh, who really loves dogs, (and who, when I asked him if he wanted to see the movie "Marley and Me," because he loves dogs, responded, "Yeah, that's what I want to do: watch a movie about people who have dogs, when I can't have one."), because you have made a profile for your dog on the facebook. Good for you. You even love other people's dogs, whereas I am indifferent to them. I love my own dogs. I love Pete best, and then Forrest too, because they would pant on you while you cried the tears of injustice and childhood, and sometimes, when they would hear us playing at recess, they would leave home, just like those dogs on that movie, and journey down the road to come visit us at Manchester School. (That's how I know that dogs can talk: "Hey Pete, you want to go play with Richard and Carrie?" "I don't know Forrest, that's almost a mile away, and I have very very short legs...but, I miss them, so okay." And also because my Mom talks to the dogs every morning.) Matty was so dear and, despite her unassuming size, would do battle with vicious varmints of any weight, and emerge victorious. I appreciate Sezi for her tenacity in chasing the squirrels, which continue to taunt her in her failure to catch them; she is the anti-Matty. (When Spencer came to live at the farm, Sezi took him on a tour of the yard: "over here is where we dig holes, and over here is where we drink water, and this is where I chase squirrels. I catch them all the time." And I adore her because she reminds me of one of the hyenas in the Lion King.) But other people's dogs? No. I do not like it when other people's dogs lick me with their suspicious mouths or leave their itchy hairs on my dark clothing. I do not like that one bit. Though I am sure Logan is a wonderful dog. We are friends, after all. And so in a way, he is a little bit mine.
The problem with me and with dogs, and with the Lion King too, is that I am very good at reflecting the emotions of other people onto myself. This is why the Nightmare on Elm Street movies, despite their generally terrible screen writing and acting, terrified me: I knew just what it would feel like if your bus driver tore off his skin and drove the school bus to Hell. And this is why I always cried during the season finales of the OC, because I could imagine how Ryan felt when he went back to Chino or when Marissa died. And the Lion King? The way that movie tore at the heartstrings it simply should have come along with coupons for boxes of tissues.
So you see, I am indifferent to other dogs, but not wholly insensitive.
I remember sitting in the backseat of our truck, being very small, smelling the corn dust and sunshine that remained in the upholstery, listening to the song "Feed Jake" on the radio. "Feed Jake, he's been a good boy, and my best friend right through it all...and if I die before I wake, feed Jake." I think it was the first time that I had ever cried real emotional tears, not just tantrum tears or spoiled tears, but honest to goodness tears of incredible grief. That poor man and his dog. And what about Pete? If I died, would Pete be fed? Though probably he could have lived for years on his own fat reserve, it was horrible to think of Jake being hungry and of Pete being alone.
Being tremendously sentimental is not my finest trait, and for this reason I mostly stick to cats. They have a pleasant cuddly component, but do not lend themselves to quite the same amount of hopeless sobbing (though I must admit to an irrational love for kittens). Cats are for the strong! But just like Disney and the Pirates of the Mississippi, most anyone with a good, sad dog story can bring me to tears. Regular dog stories have little effect aside from impatience, except for when my friend Rachel used to follow up anyone's tale of tragedy or woe with "oh that happened to my dog." (As in, "my grandmother developed diabetes last summer." "oh, my dog just developed diabetes.") Those stories filled me with sinister hilarity.
Really good, sad dog stories, though, fill me with tears.
Last year, when I was substitute teaching, (I know, I know), I was in the Clinton Middle School, where they were secretly experimenting with honors and remedial fifth grade classes. So there I was, in the remedial fifth grade class, reading through a substitute teacher's guide filled with advisories about students who had rage issues and difficulties working with other students, who needed extra time on all assignments, and who spoke English as a second language. Occasionally, the chubby boy with the untied shoes would start to cry, because he constantly got the wrong answer when we did math problems on the board. Sometimes, Tommy would get up and yell in anger, because he "didn't care anymore and never wants to spell anything!" Several of the students went to special teachers throughout the day, two should have been in the sixth grade, and they were all counting on their fingers when we broached multiplication. Beyond nine times one, we were not in good shape.
Dry erase marker in hand, I tried to help them push through their inability to understand anything by drawing colorful animations on the board; loving them despite the fact that the only thing that they understood was when the board would require erasing, which sent them into the middle school hysterics of volunteerism. Everyone was trying, but no one was succeeding. And so our afternoon waned on without success, until one student suggested that I read to them from the book Chicken Soup for the Dog Lover's Soul.
I opened to the book mark and began to read aloud. The story unfolded: an old man was in the hospital, presumably to die. In the weeks before his end, his daughter began to bring his very old dog to the hospital to visit him. The dog was his best friend and so the visits from the dog were the highlights of his days. Likewise, the dog would eagerly await the visits to the hospital and spend the rest of the time moping about the house. When the man fell into a coma, the dog became even more lethargic, except when it came time to go to the hospital. And even the man, in his deteriorating state, continued to react to the familiar touch of the dog's nose and the warmth of the soft fur. By the end of the story, when the old man died and the dog died at the exact same time, I was fighting back tears.
I looked up for the very first time to see all the children in the room sobbing. The big chubby boy with the untied shoelaces blubbered, "My sister's rabbit jumped off the table and broke its back yesterday!" Tommy stood up and ran for the door, "I hate this story! It made me cry." Another boy stood up and chased after him, "I hate my neighbor! He ran over my cat!" Two girls were hugging each other, trying to console each other for their lost fish and dead birds. A tiny ESL girl wandered around the room, alarmed, but oblivious to the cause of the commotion, handing out tissues to the other students, "Aqui. Aqui." I started to think of Pete, and subsequently began to weep. "Give me a tissue little girl!" I called, though she did not understand me, so I just stood at the podium, wiping my eyes in my shirt and trying to hide my face in my collar.
I hope that you can reflect these emotions onto yourself, so that you can visualize thirty ruddy cheeked, leaking fifth graders yelling at their equally un-composed "teacher" about how much they missed their pets. It should make you wonder at my competence, sad for the dogs and the kids, and chuckle at the unfortunate nature of the situation.
Please feel my pain and say hola to Logan for me.
I am writing this for you, because you might well love dogs more than anyone else I know. Maybe even more than Josh, who really loves dogs, (and who, when I asked him if he wanted to see the movie "Marley and Me," because he loves dogs, responded, "Yeah, that's what I want to do: watch a movie about people who have dogs, when I can't have one."), because you have made a profile for your dog on the facebook. Good for you. You even love other people's dogs, whereas I am indifferent to them. I love my own dogs. I love Pete best, and then Forrest too, because they would pant on you while you cried the tears of injustice and childhood, and sometimes, when they would hear us playing at recess, they would leave home, just like those dogs on that movie, and journey down the road to come visit us at Manchester School. (That's how I know that dogs can talk: "Hey Pete, you want to go play with Richard and Carrie?" "I don't know Forrest, that's almost a mile away, and I have very very short legs...but, I miss them, so okay." And also because my Mom talks to the dogs every morning.) Matty was so dear and, despite her unassuming size, would do battle with vicious varmints of any weight, and emerge victorious. I appreciate Sezi for her tenacity in chasing the squirrels, which continue to taunt her in her failure to catch them; she is the anti-Matty. (When Spencer came to live at the farm, Sezi took him on a tour of the yard: "over here is where we dig holes, and over here is where we drink water, and this is where I chase squirrels. I catch them all the time." And I adore her because she reminds me of one of the hyenas in the Lion King.) But other people's dogs? No. I do not like it when other people's dogs lick me with their suspicious mouths or leave their itchy hairs on my dark clothing. I do not like that one bit. Though I am sure Logan is a wonderful dog. We are friends, after all. And so in a way, he is a little bit mine.
The problem with me and with dogs, and with the Lion King too, is that I am very good at reflecting the emotions of other people onto myself. This is why the Nightmare on Elm Street movies, despite their generally terrible screen writing and acting, terrified me: I knew just what it would feel like if your bus driver tore off his skin and drove the school bus to Hell. And this is why I always cried during the season finales of the OC, because I could imagine how Ryan felt when he went back to Chino or when Marissa died. And the Lion King? The way that movie tore at the heartstrings it simply should have come along with coupons for boxes of tissues.
So you see, I am indifferent to other dogs, but not wholly insensitive.
I remember sitting in the backseat of our truck, being very small, smelling the corn dust and sunshine that remained in the upholstery, listening to the song "Feed Jake" on the radio. "Feed Jake, he's been a good boy, and my best friend right through it all...and if I die before I wake, feed Jake." I think it was the first time that I had ever cried real emotional tears, not just tantrum tears or spoiled tears, but honest to goodness tears of incredible grief. That poor man and his dog. And what about Pete? If I died, would Pete be fed? Though probably he could have lived for years on his own fat reserve, it was horrible to think of Jake being hungry and of Pete being alone.
Being tremendously sentimental is not my finest trait, and for this reason I mostly stick to cats. They have a pleasant cuddly component, but do not lend themselves to quite the same amount of hopeless sobbing (though I must admit to an irrational love for kittens). Cats are for the strong! But just like Disney and the Pirates of the Mississippi, most anyone with a good, sad dog story can bring me to tears. Regular dog stories have little effect aside from impatience, except for when my friend Rachel used to follow up anyone's tale of tragedy or woe with "oh that happened to my dog." (As in, "my grandmother developed diabetes last summer." "oh, my dog just developed diabetes.") Those stories filled me with sinister hilarity.
Really good, sad dog stories, though, fill me with tears.
Last year, when I was substitute teaching, (I know, I know), I was in the Clinton Middle School, where they were secretly experimenting with honors and remedial fifth grade classes. So there I was, in the remedial fifth grade class, reading through a substitute teacher's guide filled with advisories about students who had rage issues and difficulties working with other students, who needed extra time on all assignments, and who spoke English as a second language. Occasionally, the chubby boy with the untied shoes would start to cry, because he constantly got the wrong answer when we did math problems on the board. Sometimes, Tommy would get up and yell in anger, because he "didn't care anymore and never wants to spell anything!" Several of the students went to special teachers throughout the day, two should have been in the sixth grade, and they were all counting on their fingers when we broached multiplication. Beyond nine times one, we were not in good shape.
Dry erase marker in hand, I tried to help them push through their inability to understand anything by drawing colorful animations on the board; loving them despite the fact that the only thing that they understood was when the board would require erasing, which sent them into the middle school hysterics of volunteerism. Everyone was trying, but no one was succeeding. And so our afternoon waned on without success, until one student suggested that I read to them from the book Chicken Soup for the Dog Lover's Soul.
I opened to the book mark and began to read aloud. The story unfolded: an old man was in the hospital, presumably to die. In the weeks before his end, his daughter began to bring his very old dog to the hospital to visit him. The dog was his best friend and so the visits from the dog were the highlights of his days. Likewise, the dog would eagerly await the visits to the hospital and spend the rest of the time moping about the house. When the man fell into a coma, the dog became even more lethargic, except when it came time to go to the hospital. And even the man, in his deteriorating state, continued to react to the familiar touch of the dog's nose and the warmth of the soft fur. By the end of the story, when the old man died and the dog died at the exact same time, I was fighting back tears.
I looked up for the very first time to see all the children in the room sobbing. The big chubby boy with the untied shoelaces blubbered, "My sister's rabbit jumped off the table and broke its back yesterday!" Tommy stood up and ran for the door, "I hate this story! It made me cry." Another boy stood up and chased after him, "I hate my neighbor! He ran over my cat!" Two girls were hugging each other, trying to console each other for their lost fish and dead birds. A tiny ESL girl wandered around the room, alarmed, but oblivious to the cause of the commotion, handing out tissues to the other students, "Aqui. Aqui." I started to think of Pete, and subsequently began to weep. "Give me a tissue little girl!" I called, though she did not understand me, so I just stood at the podium, wiping my eyes in my shirt and trying to hide my face in my collar.
I hope that you can reflect these emotions onto yourself, so that you can visualize thirty ruddy cheeked, leaking fifth graders yelling at their equally un-composed "teacher" about how much they missed their pets. It should make you wonder at my competence, sad for the dogs and the kids, and chuckle at the unfortunate nature of the situation.
Please feel my pain and say hola to Logan for me.
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