This post is contributed by Barnaby Porter from his archives. Read the previous post here.
On this cold winter night, with the thermometer and the clock both reading lonely single numbers, I find myself wondering about the wild creatures out there. Where are they, and how are they faring?
Then I look at the dog at my feet, old Huss. Hardly a wild animal, she’s sprawled out, luxuriating on her huge, red plaid bed, snoring and wheezing, her feet twitching. She certainly gives all the indications of being comfortable. Like a horsemeat factory, her safety valve vents Alpo-tainted methane at regular intervals, to the point that I envy the wild things the one thing they surely have an abundance of this night – fresh air. And it dawns on me what we have gone and done by domesticating the dog.
Somewhere back along, the wild wolf, Canis lupus, got into the habit of hanging around old Homo erectus. It was a working combination apparently. Everyone benefitted, had a lot of fun and spent endless amounts of time just hanging around evolving together. The result was what we now call the common dog, Fruitus lupus. And, wouldn’t you know it, we call ourselves Homo sapiens, the all-knowing (or wise) man, who, in all his wisdom, took a magnificent wild creature, an apex predator with frost sparkling on his neck ruff and transformed him into today’s silly and laughable, tail wagging character for whom the high moment of the day is brought on by the sound of a can opener.
Out there, beyond the farthest trees and beyond and beyond, there are no can openers and no red plaid beds. Comfort depends wholly on fur or feathers and a break from the wind, a fat layer, good bone marrow, food certainly, and, though it isn’t taught in school, a state of mind that deals with winter as it must be dealt with – not as a victim going “Brrrrr” all the time, but as a participant, living with it, dealing with it, coping.
Now, looking down at old Huss at my feet – which is she? This is a complicated question. She hardly looks the “victim,” but then she doesn’t strike me as the hardy, survivor type either. Somehow, in her own way, she has learned to “game” the system as it exists, to play on her provider’s sympathies and to keep him loading the stove. It’s a survival arrangement that seems to work pretty well – Fruitus lupus and Homo sapiens – I can’t deny it.
Artist and author Barnaby Porter has had a varied career in marine research, aquaculture, and woodworking, among others. Most recently he partnered with his wife Susan as co-owners of the Maine Coast Book Shop & Cafe in downtown Damariscotta. In October 2021, Barnaby completed his tenure on Coastal Rivers’ Board of Trustees after six years of service.
Featured photo courtesy of Barnaby Porter. Collage of toast-masked dogs courtesy of the Internet.
