Great pets

I go for a jog, just to celebrate the rare day of above – forty degree weather. I learn a few things. For example, the trail I ran all through the summer may be too messy for mid December. Gotta stick to the main drag that they keep plowed for the fire access vehicles. By the time I’m coming back the dog walkers are out. Along Sheridan it’s mostly little dogs not being kept on tight enough leashes. The lady in the fur coat wanders down one side of the sidewalk, possibly still in last night’s stupor. Her fido generally takes a path at the opposite side of the walk, effectively creating a neat snare for other pedestrians or, say, me. A hefty woman passes in front of me holding two lhasa apso’s on leashes. The dogs are each wearing mink doggie coats.

Hey lady, can I be your dog? In fact, while we’re at it, I think there are a few hundred people who have just spent a dozen cold, hungry nights wandering the streets of Chicago who find your pouch’s predicament quite enviable.

Why, really, must we have these strange beasts, with whom communication is so much left to guess work and whose bodily functions require so much vigilance, in our homes? What’s the payoff? How can the devotion of such fuzzy cuteness possibly outweigh the hassle of walkies on cold mornings, visits to the groomer and the cost of kenneling when one must go to the Bahamas for those two weeks in February?

Why not adopt homeless people as pets? I know it sounds horribly crass, like I’m talking about treating the disadvantaged like beasts. But come on. Take a walk through the Loop during tourist season or during the holidays and count, for once, those people on the margins who are so easy to ignore despite the cup full of coins they rattle. Sometimes I stop and give them money and ask them their name. They look at me in shock, and hesitate, as if they’ve forgotten they had one. They’ve compressed their own personhood down to so unrecognizable a form that it takes a second or two to cough out those couple of syllables that make up their label. Treat them like a dog? If that means a warm corner of a house, decent food out of one’s own bowl twice a day and maybe even a mink coat for taking a walk in, that is a fat upgrade.

Those two lap dogs were allowed more personality and identity than the average homeless person. Their quirks, perhaps a tendency to drink from the loo, defecate in the marble entryway, bark at the slightest noise and chew expensive shoes (a crime punishable by death in my book) are met with more tolerance than is shown the average human, especially one that we can perceive as being down on their luck.

So why not have homeless people as pets. I’d wager they can be trained to suit any household. Even the most mentally ill person can muster greater sense than a beast who speaks no verbal language. If the dog’s purpose lies in its fuzzy factor, then simply refrain from having the homeless person shave the beard that living on the street has caused to grow. They can shower themselves without the expense of a trip to the Bark Bark club. They can use a toilet. How great would that be in the middle of February when it’s all of zero outside. Oh wait, you’ll be out of town. Well, you’re pet person can watch the house or even come along on the trip! The advantages are countless. All for the cost of some love…

And what’s so bad about this idea? I mean, we may as well let the concept sink into our consciousness now. Once the Martians tire of playing with the toy robots we keep sending them as friendship offerings, they will ride on over to pay our twinkly little world with it’s orbiting trash ring a visit. And they will probably take one look at how the lot of us have mismanaged things and decide that we’d just make good pets.