I Am A Dog

Written By Big P

I am a Dog. As yet I have no name. I’ve no idea where I was born. The first thing I remember is that, I don’t know but maybe two years ago, I was rattling the windows of a dark alley with my pitiful yipping and yapping. The purpose of this crusade was to summon something to rescue me from the box I had woken up in, and summon something I did. He was a queer-looking fellow, and though I have been long acquainted with him at this point, his queerness in appearance still manages to shock me from time to time. He who I would later call my Master ambled over to my box with purpose, his banana leaf ears bouncing and his spectacles sliding down his snout, only to be pushed up before they fell off completely. My shock, however, was primarily directed at his nakedness. Not a tuft of fur could be found on his body, and while I did and still do find this quite scandalous, he at least had the sense to cover up with a silk wrap.
The fact that I was in terrible danger, likely to be eaten by this shamefully naked monster, only became more apparent as he took me in his arms, growling something ill-manneredly. While I have at this point forgotten what it was he first said to me, I do remember that it only made me less confident in my chances of escaping the situation with my life. The comical size of his nose became all the more apparent as I was hoisted into the air, he who would become my Master caring not that I struggled and pleaded with him to let me live, but to be honest with you, dear Reader, I was also beginning to think that whatever creature I had encountered was most likely one that is predestined to starvation. After all, that fleshy thing that was affixed to his face so haphazardly would no doubt get in the way of his eating.
But then yet another thought came to me. Merciful Gods! This creature eats with its nose!
Unwilling to be subjected to a fate as terrible as being digested by the sinuses, my younger self nipped at the hands of this cruel Titan, but I made yet another horrible revelation. Dear Reader, this revelation was that this monster was prepared for this event, and I was no match at all. To my young brain (though I know better now), it seemed very obvious that the creature who gripped me in his fingers was specifically adapted for a lifestyle of picking up small, innocent puppies out of straw-lined boxes in alleyways; the puppies, of course, being easy prey. As he and his were often bit by these desperate dogs, his kind saw it fit to develop skin hard as leather, and a puppy such as I was is almost never equipped with weaponry of a caliber enough to pierce anything more than a rabbit’s ear. If I had come to the field of battle with a strong club or perhaps even a rifle I could grip with my paws, there is no doubt in my mind I could have slain the villain there and then, but alas, I was forced to resign myself to a fate of being consumed by this creature’s fleshy beak; all the years of my life I had yet to live stolen from me by a creature whose wickedness is so great as to cause even his own fur to flee from his body in terror.
Here, the Trinity blessed me, allowing me to pass out from fright rather than to suffer the humiliation that any self-respecting predator no doubt feels when he himself is eaten. When I came to, I was not in the placid valleys and serene forests of Tūāwhiorangi, much to my surprise. No, no, I was not surrounded by fresh-faced Souls picnicking on lawns of silk and bathing in springs so clear one can even see through their reflection, I was sat on a cushion next to a black metal box that bubbled and radiated heat. Evidently, my rousing from fear-induced coma caught the attention of the monster’s family. If I was not doomed then, I was certainly doomed now. Three of the brutes, who I figured to be the puppies of the monster whose den I was now situated in, ran to my pillow, pulling on my fur, smacking me atop my head, and shoving their sticky little paws into my mouth. It should come as no surprise to anyone reading this account that I tired of this almost as soon as it started and bit one of the little bastards when she tried to introduce her finger to my tongue.
I would like to take this moment to remind you that this was not a malicious action. It is simply the law. If a burglar breaks into a house, he is carted off to jail. No one weeps for the burglar for he is a criminal who stepped where he was not allowed and took what he did not own. The same principle, in a world ruled by my kind, would apply here. The pup’s finger ventured somewhere it was not allowed. It touched something it was not allowed. So it was, dear reader, that the pup’s finger was nipped. Alas, the world is not ruled by dogs (though in my age and experience I have largely come to be more appreciative of that fact) and my attempt at self-preservation was taken to be an act of war.
The burglarizing pup wailed loudly, which called the afore-told events to the attention of its parents. The two Titans came stomping over to me, and though I had already let go of the tyke’s disgusting paw and was looking more innocent than a Trinitist Saint, they saw fit to smack me hard upon my nose. The nerve! They took me into their home against my will, my tiny brain imagining I was to be eaten, and if that were not bad enough, they set their children upon me to do me all sorts of mischief. When I put up the most pitiful of defenses, and a rightful defense at that, they did not even give me a warrior’s death, instead seeing fit to bop me upon the snout. All and all, it was a dreadful introduction, and I did not get a wink of sleep that night for fear that they would use the opportunity to put me into a pot.
As it happened, I was not eaten. It seemed that, instead of feasting upon my flesh (what little of it there was), the family of Goblins desired to keep me as a pet. Five of them lived in the house, not including the servant girl, it falling to the children or the servant to refill my bowls of water and food each day as needed. I will now complain about my fare. The family into which I have been adopted is rather well off as far as I can tell. I have heard the stories of rural poverty: households without running water or electricity, lived in by cold, starving folk who shit in outhouses. My family has running water, have electricity, and shit in toilets. This is due to the fact that the patriarch of the family, my Master, is a doctor of medicine. His chosen profession, I think, showcases perfectly the difference between my kind and his kind. Though I am around Goblins more than I am around dogs, I know in my heart that almost any dog would come to my aid if it was required. After all, we are pack animals, and pack animals care for one another no matter what. If I were out in the woods and I broke a leg, I would have my food delivered to me by my folk. Such altruism is as ingrained in us as the desire to fly is ingrained in a sparrow.
This is not so for the Goblins. My Master wakes up late in the morning every day, has the breakfast his wife cooks for him, and then goes out to his place of work. Hours later, he comes back, carrying the checks and coins he has looted. Were he a sandal maker, this would not be so bad, for I am led to believe that business is conducted through something known as “supply and demand”. A customer wants to be supplied with sandals, so the sandal maker demands payment for the services rendered. This is all well and good because the customer can choose whether or not he wants a pair of sandals on that particular day and from that particular craftsman, and the prosperity that such practices bring is apparent to all within our noble realm. Yet, not one thinking being in the history of Ecumene has ever woken up in the morning, said “Today I shall break a bone so that I can go the doctor’s office and pay him a few hundred Porohita just so that I can know for sure my bone is broken”, got out of bed, then went to do just that.
So it is that doctors are robbers. They demand money from those who do not even want to be supplied. To a dog, the sin here is clear as spring water, but one supposes that the chronic blindness of the Goblinoid race also impedes their ability to recognize injustice. The fact that my Master is one who engages in such predatory practices becomes even more surprising once you get to know him. He is, to me, rather kind. He gives me lodgings, rubs me upon my stomach if I desire it, and works tirelessly (although pointlessly) to instill good morals in his devil children. When not at his doctoring station, he reads books in his private study, smokes a pipe with his friends when they come to call, or listens to the radio with his family for news of the Unification Campaigns. A good Goblin, though somewhat meek, though obviously not when it comes to robbing the sick and injured of their hard-earned cash. I do not think he can even conduct a surgery, whatever that entails.
Using the money that my Master brings in almost daily, the Wife and the servant girl go to the market almost every day to buy the food for the night’s dinner and the morrow’s breakfast. Usually, they do not bring home too much, just a few fish or a cut of pork, and a bouquet of vegetables. Every few weeks, they will bring home a great big bag of rice, though with the speed the Goblins seem to devour what amounts to grains of sand, it is a surprise they do not buy bigger bags at more regular intervals.
Now, with the proper context given, I will now make good on my promise and describe the prison food I must choke down to survive. Every day, I am forced to watch the family wake up smiling as they savor the flavors of fatty bacon, long Elven-style sausage, fish paste, or eggs and ground unicorn chevaline with gravy. Every night, my stomach pangs with hunger and sadness as I witness the ritual consumption of braised ham, fresh fish, or marinated chicken. Though I am loathe to even write the word “vegetable”, the inclusion of any number of these plants on the plates of my Master and his family only serves to further show me that they have and I have not. Every single day, for every single meal, I am given a bowl of mushy, leftover rice heaped over a few scraps of cold, stringy meat. I had compared this to prison food, but I think even prisoners are given some variety in their daily meals.
The last thing I want to do, however, is to complain. Compared to some of the dogs I have met in my two years of life, I may just as well be living in the palace of His Majesty. Some of these dogs I know, such as the long-coated mutt owned by the local streetsweep, live very hard lives. This dog I had mentioned is given no meals by his master, for his master hardly has meals himself, and so has resolved to hunt the squirrels and rats of the city. There is no doubt in my mind that this already large specimen could be even larger was he fed properly, though perhaps for that I should be thankful. I have heard one of my Master’s friends once before say that the poor are poor due to some sort of inherent barbarism and that while they are useful for laying bricks and sweeping streets, this inherent rudeness is and should bar them from the halls of civil society and from bureaucratic government. This gentleman, whose name is Mr. Rehipeti, is an esteemed servant of the government, working a job in the Treasury about which he frequently speaks. As there is no doubt in my mind that such a hard worker as Rehipeti (who frequently reminds my Master and his other friends that the only thing keeping him from procuring a wife is his strict schedule) is incapable of not knowing what he is talking about, and admittedly, the streetsweep’s dog can be a bit of a rough character, I am inclined to agree with this assessment and can therefore confidently say that we ought to stop feeding the poor. After all, if we keep feeding them, they might get big, and a well-built thug is much more threatening than a thug who is a shrimp.
The idea that, due to my being adopted into a doctor’s family, reduces if not entirely removes barbarism from my soul gives me great satisfaction. I know that it does not just because of the ideas spoken by Mr. Rehipeti, but through my own soul searching. Dear Reader, it is my opinion that any being with half a brain can tell if they are a barbarian or not, and I have come to realize I am not. I encourage those at home reading this to figure such things out for themselves, for knowing whether or not you are a barbarian will no doubt save you countless headaches and social misunderstandings. Though I do love and respect my Master and his family, I would be lying if I said that a great deal of my motivation for staying with him is for the fact that any alternative option is likely to pump some degree of savagery back into my soul, and to avoid this terrible fate, I have resigned to stay with my Master in his home, sleeping on his cushions and eating mushy rice until the Gods call me to Them.