Sleeping Dogs

Some London friends went to Greece for the week so we’re dog sitting their pooch, a gray furry thing called Wolfie. I don’t know her breed but she’s a medium-sized dog the color of sooty smoke. When we arrived at Wolfie’s home, she greeted us at the front door with only the barest suspicion. It was nice to walk into her home without feeling the need to explain ourselves beyond sticking out our hands to be sniffed. With those formalities out of the way, Wolfie accepted us as her houseguests and retired back to her spot at the top of the stairs to resume her nap.

We have two dogs at home in Savannah, a white Lab named Ole (pronounced in the Norwegian fashion, not the Mexican) and a little shit dog named Squash, one of those ratty-looking mutts so common in the South. We also have a black and white cat named Alfalfa who is just the right amount of aloof. Our son has been watching the pets for the past five months while we’ve been in Europe. While I can’t honestly say I’ve missed them very much, I’m sort of excited to get home to them in a few weeks. That excitement will last for exactly as long as it takes for them one of them to throw up on the carpet.

Pictured: couple of dumb assholes.

Every now and again, I think about how odd it is that we choose to live with animals. I’ll be on the couch watching TV or something and look over and see a few furry creatures at my feet just kind of chilling out. It’s startling: why the hell are there animals in my house? And yes, I know we’ve spent the last few millennia domesticating certain species to serve our purposes (and, arguably, theirs) but still… to share one’s life with creatures so different from ourselves occasionally strikes me as bizarre. Lovely, too, but bizarre.

Then again, why should it feel strange at all?

Humanity’s greatest folly has been trying to create separation between ourselves and “the natural world.” That’s never been more evident than this summer, as wildfires level towns in Hawaii, Sicily, and Greece, at least some which is apparently still safe enough to accommodate our friend’s vacation. The coronavirus is also staging a comeback. In the US, a new omicron variant called EG.5 is now the dominant strain, sending Covid hospitalizations up 12.5%. And orcas are still attacking boats. The latest story happened a couple days ago. Two whales attacked a French yacht, cracking its hull, and forcing the captain to issue a mayday call. The latest theory on the root cause of these attacks is that an orca named White Gladis “is seeking revenge after being traumatized by a collision with a boat, or being trapped in illegal fishing nets.” Naturally, we’re all rooting for the orcas.

I’m as guilty of this separation as anybody else. For me, one of the great appeals of dog sitting Wolfie this week is that our friend’s home has air-conditioning, a rarity here in the UK. Although the British summer has been one of the coldest and wettest on record, temps still occasionally rise to proper summer levels, and nothing feels better on this pampered American’s skin than a breeze of artificially chilled air. The house also has a real clothes dryer, anathema to British sensibilities, who prefer their clean laundry damp and crunchy. A savage people, the Brits. One need look no further than their sandwich preferences to understand why their empire fell. Mayonnaise and prawns, indeed.

Yet when it comes to making peace with the natural world, I suppose even the Brits have a leg up on us Yanks. To this day, 32% of Americans believe that “the U.S. should prioritize expanding oil, coal, and natural gas production,” while 28% actually “oppose the U.S. taking steps to become carbon neutral by 2050.” Are we actually idiots? That is, of course, a rhetorical question.

As the orcas strike back on behalf of an aggrieved planet, it’s no surprise that so many Americans choose to ignore, obfuscate, and actively oppose steps that would nudge our planet back into balance. After all, an entire political party has made opposing science a foundational plank of its platform. In this way, they’re choosing to not just separate ourselves from the natural world, but from reality itself. Senator Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican running for president said on Fox & Friends yesterday that it is “ridiculous to talk about climate emergency when we have a border emergency right now.” Never mind that we don’t currently have a border emergency and never mind that the climate is accelerating global migration. What matters is the message, even if the message is a lie. Tim Scott, of course, representing the moderate wing of the Republican party. How strange that the “facts don’t care about your feelings” party happily ignores both feelings and facts when it comes to inconvenient science.

Then again, maybe they have a point. When the science says we’re heading for catastrophe maybe a “head in sand” strategy isn’t the worst course of action. After all, on an individual level, ignoring a problem of this magnitude is about as effective as worrying about it. For all of my hand-wringing, that’s mostly what I do. The air-conditioner remains on. The clothes dryer is waiting. Wolfie is at my feet, content, also blithely ignoring the problems of the world. Maybe the reason we keep pets is to not only remind us of our connection to the natural world but to justify our choice in altering it. After all, if the animals we welcome into our homes are this happy, how wrong can we be? Maybe we should join the willfully ignorant 28% and just let sleeping dogs lie.

What’s the worst that could happen?