November 28, 2007
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Toughy
I was visiting my relatives in NY this past weekend. There I encountered this dog named Toughy. That’s how it was pronounced anyway. I’m not sure if it was spelled Toughy or Tuffy but the joke of the day was definitely that it was “Toughy” meaning that it was one *tough* little dog or at least it acted tough.
The dog was really tiny. Smaller than most cats. But it had attitude. It would growl. It would bear its teeth. It would bark at people. It was very protective, patrolling the area looking for things going wrong, intruders or enemies. There was another dog in the household too, a much bigger dog, but Toughy saw it as his duty to protect that other dog and he wouldn’t let anyone disturb her, just like he wouldn’t let anyone invade his space or disrupt his families business.
Twice that day it had bitten two different people. It just got mad at them and bit them. Just like that. This tiny little dog strutted about like it was the tough man in the
house. Nobody better mess with me. That was the attitude he tried to
portray. But since it was a small dog we all laughed and nobody thought much of it. Toughy was just being Toughy.
The funny thing is as the day went on, for some reason I was able to get Toughy on my side. He really warmed up to me. He was mad or at least wary of everybody else but me he became my friend. He curled up at my feet and rolled around and let me pet him and rub him and he seemed genuinely happy to be around me.My Mom said that I have that kind of natural affinity for animals. That they just come to like me and that it just comes natural to me. That’d be a damn cool power to have. Too bad that’s just false. Humans are animals too and certainly I’ve got no affinity there. No I think the more likely that if I have any power at all it is an affinity for creatures who act like they want to be left alone but in reality want for anything but that. I guess I can relate to that kind of a personality. And I think that’s what was Toughy’s deal. He was trying to push people away but all he wanted was someone to give him attention anyway. I did, and so we became buddies for a short a while anyway.
While it’s true that there have been a number of dogs and cats and other creatures that have been surprisingly cool with me even when they weren’t with very many others,, like Toughy, there are some noticeable exceptions. Two dogs I’ve known just absolutely despised me for no apparent reason and nothing that I could do seemed able to to correct that impression. Both were dogs of two separate friends. One when I was very young, another kid in the neighborhood. This dog would whenever she first saw me just start barking and get angry. She was too well behaved to really do anything about it and once she realized that I was a friend of the family she’d be cool with me, even letting me pet her and forgetting that I was an enemy. But I always had this little unsettling sense that she didn’t really want me there and sure enough the next time I’d visit, she’d start barking again first thing like she either forgot me entirely or was just pretending to tolerate me last time. The other dog was a more recent encounter and whereas that other dog seemed annoyed at having me around and like she wanted to get rid of me, this one flat out despised me. He wanted to attack me. I was the enemy, the intruder the entire time I was in his presence. And he bit me once even when I was trying to give him treats to make him my friend, which my friend assures me works most of the time. I am quite sure that this dog would want to hurt me no matter what I did. He just thought I was evil or something. The threat that needed to be excised from his domain. That his masters liked me was irrelevant.
Is that strange? When I think back there have been people that I’ve met who have been like that too. They just seem to have an aversion to me. And I don’t comprehend it. It doesn’t really bother me. Neither did these dogs. I just find it confusing. Incomprehensible. I wonder why. Just like I wonder why those other creatures like Toughy take a liking to me. It seems so strange that creatures make such decisions so arbitrarily. To be someone’s friend or to not be someone’s friend? To care about someone or not? To hate someone or not? It seems like such a matter of instinct and whim rather than reason and knowledge. Why is that? I’ve always wondered.
And what about me? I think about the people I’ve known and although I can’t think of anyone for whom I developed a pure irrational unjustified hatred for there have been those who for some reason or another I just could not see myself as being their friend. Rationally they seemed wholly interesting beings like everybody else worthy of getting to know. But for some reason, I just didn’t have any interest in them. I wasn’t curious about them. I didn’t want to know them better. I just didn’t care if I ever saw them again. And there are others who likewise I find myself feeling an affinity for. People I really want to learn more about. People I’m curious about right from the start. I want to know them. I want to be their friend. Why? There isn’t anything about them in particular that makes me feel that way. I just seem to.Whether or not I ever talk to them or see them again, that feeling never disappears.
I wonder what causes these impressions. And is it possible to move beyond them? Is it desirable to move beyond them? Sometimes I wonder about these things…
