Ask Alexios: Cindy’s Choice

Cindy,
I wouldn’t classify you as a terrible mom, but neither would I laud you as Mother of the Year. Ironically though, I have posed your dilemma as a hypothetical question many times… “If your house was on fire would your first impulse be to save your family or your pet?” The responses I receive are always identical displays of offended righteous indignation, but beneath the predictable bluster I can detect the queasy acknowledgement of an uncomfortable truth, and I’m left with the impression that most people would instinctively rush to rescue their beloved companion animals while leaving their own flesh and blood to fend for themselves in those initial critical moments. Cindy, reflect back upon your life and tell me, did you hold true fondness for any of your friends? Did you display more contempt than love for your mother during your teenage years, and was ambivalence the best feeling that you could muster for your father? You sit on hard plastic seats in Wendy’s or Burger King everyday at noon not to enjoy a fatty, high-sodium lunch with a few coworkers, but instead to spread malicious gossip about the colleagues who remained back at the office. As I’ve travelled through the ages my observation has been that people don’t like each other, but despite the natural inclination for animosity, just about everyone craves attention.  Watch ants as they swarm over a squirming defenseless earthworm. The industrious insects work together for one common good and harbor no sense of individual identity. Mankind is distinguished from those lowly little bugs by an overwhelming desire for  personal validation. The need to be admired, envied, idolized and cheered on is steeped into the human DNA. Seven thousand years ago I was released from the shackles of mortality, but some conventional attributes persist, and like any normal person, even I am still enchanted by the notion of myself. Maybe that’s why people hold such profound feelings of endearment for animals. Beasts are pure. Unadulterated by an advanced intellect floating in a miasma of overblown self-worth, they never disappoint or fail to live up to expectations. They are quite simply what they are.

Yesterday, as the sun was beginning to set, I made my way out into the gathering gloom and saw a young mother walking down the street pushing a huge stroller that looked like the well-appointed interior of a luxury model automobile. Strapped into the plush seat was a lethargic moon-faced infant, and for a creature experiencing most things the world has to offer for the first time, it exhibited a startling sense of general disinterest for its surroundings. The baby would occasionally slide its eyes left or right towards some movement or flash of color, but then would return its dull gaze forward and yawn with bored distaste. For her part, the child’s mother appeared defiantly proud of the uninspired product of her labor, and with a slight twist of her wrists she deftly steered the stroller to offer the best view of her baby to anyone passing by, but no one paid much notice no matter how artfully she tried to attract their attention. “I’m glad he didn’t ask me out, but I was still kind of bummed…” a blond girl in skinny jeans and a Marc Jacob coat said to her small group of friends then looked down at the baby, winced and shuddered, “Jesus! Can you imagine?!” Two guys dressed in gym clothes under their leather jackets had to step aside to avoid a collision with the stroller. “Ask him for a spot next time you’re benching,” one said to the other. “Would that look sort of obvious?” was the reply as they veered nonchalantly around the mother, the stroller and the baby. People preoccupied with their ipods, iphones or technologically unencumbered private thoughts passed by without giving the slightest hint of regard to mother and child, then finally a post-menopausal woman offered some relief from the relentless indifference when she stopped, leaned over in an ungainly combination of bent knees and arched back, smiled directly in the fat little infant’s face and said, “Precious!” For the first time the baby reacted in a meaningful way and began to scream.

Suddenly, a new presence appeared from around the corner in the form of a young man with a puppy on a leash, and instantly he achieved a popularity equal to Jesus doling out the loaves and fishes. Everyone stopped to offer cooing exclamations to the tiny dog squirming and bouncing as if his legs were loaded with springs. There was nothing remarkable about the mutt – he was a shelter puppy, a little mongrel, not one of the popular pure-breeds – but anyone who passed by fell hopelessly under his adorable spell…even the young mother. The tight expression on her face softened into the hint of a smile that might have been called “sweet,” and her fingers loosened as if she imagined the playful tug of a leash in her hand. She kept her distance watching people as they knelt on the sidewalk or crouched down to accept the puppy’s slobbering enthusiasm, then her smile faded, she leaned into the stroller and pushed her burden down the street.

Cindy, I don’t enjoy lecturing you from a pompous perch in my existentialist eternity. I’m merely pointing out a fundamental fact of life – you got caught…red-handed, with your pants down, in the cold light of the day. Guilt because you cried out for your beloved chocolate lab and not your biological spawn doesn’t prey on your mind. The honest rawness of your emotional outburst stunned you, and more importantly, your neighbors bore witness to the hysterical heartfelt spectacle. You’ve been forced to acknowledge a gut reaction, an unfiltered emotion stripped of society’s pretentiously manufactured rules and regulations in a very public way. The withering disapproval of your judgemental neighbors has muddied the waters, but next time your precious little daughter screams, “I hate you!” and slams her bedroom door, or your son’s school principal calls to warn you that Jacob may be a sociopath, wrap your arms around Rusty’s warm furry neck…you’ll see things much more clearly.