Sin of the Month • Abby
Bardi |
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Fear
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"When it comes to Bush, you can cringe in your fragile home with the lights out, peering out the window and going “Woo-woo-woo,” but if he wins, there will be no place on earth left to hide."
You’re probably dying to know how my dog Henry is doing in psychotherapy. As you’ll recall, recently, a dog psychologist diagnosed Henry with debilitating anxiety issues.
Here is a list of the things Henry is afraid of:
1. People he doesn’t know
2. People he does know.
3. Dogs, whether he knows them or not.
4. People or animals who walk up to him in a friendly manner.
5. Strange sounds.
6. Household cleaning apparatus. (Luckily, he doesn’t see many of these.)
7. Empty canisters of Quaker oats. (His therapist demonstrated this for us.)
I could go on, but you get the idea: Henry is afraid of, in poet Gerard Manley Hopkins’ words, “all things counter, original, spare, [and/or] strange.”1 In short, of just about everything.
Part of retraining Henry involves desensitization—getting him to give up his fears and become comfortable with the weird things that come flying at him in this crazy world. This is accomplished by bribing him with pieces of hot dog, and so far, we’ve made a little progress, though he still runs the other way at the sight of a dustpan.
Henry likes to sit at the top of the stairs in our hallway, where he can keep one eye on me at the computer and the other on the front door. Our house is on a hill, so he has a good look at the street in front of us and can check to make sure no strange people, dogs, or canisters of Quaker oats are coming up our front walk.
The other day, my husband noticed a shiny object sitting next to one of Henry’s toys at the top of the stairs. We had been trying to figure out why there was a small hole in the wall above the stairs; we thought perhaps a rat, or even a woodpecker, had bored its way out of the attic.
But the shiny object turned out to be a bullet, and the hole above the stairs was where it had exited after coming in our front window, through two panes of glass and a Venetian blind, then going in another wall and out again. The police who arrived shortly after we made this discovery told us that the bullet was from a .45 caliber handgun, and that it had been fired from across the street.
(By the way, I had never seen a bullet before. This one was a gold knob, like a piece of jewelry, the size of a man’s fingertip. It was hard to look at it and not imagine it ripping into someone’s flesh.)
My husband remembered hearing a noise shortly after two a.m., moments after he had left the room, where he had been sitting a few feet from where the bullet came in. Clearly, Henry was not on duty when this occurred, or he would have emitted frenetic barking, which his therapist pointed out sounds like he’s saying “Woo-woo-woo.” “That’s a warning bark,” she explained. Henry woo-woos whenever anyone comes to our door, but apparently, his ability to warn does not encompass guarding against weaponry.
Luckily, Henry was not on the stairs at all when the bullet landed next to his stuffed animal, whom we call Squirrel-dog because we are unable to figure out which species he is meant to represent. Henry was asleep in the kitchen, dreaming of being chased by Quaker oats.
Ever since we found the bullet, I, too, have been beset by fears. Although I don’t bark nearly as much as Henry does, I find that like him, I am unnerved by ordinary things.
Here is a list of the things I am afraid of:
1. Being in my house.
2. Leaving my house.
3. Loud noises.
4. Sleeping, because I might miss the next gunshot. (I know, some people’s lives are like this all the time, and all I can say is, I don’t know how they do it.)
5. The original owner of our bullet.
6. The owners of other bullets.
7. The possible election of George W. Bush.
That’s right, Bush. Of all my fears, my fear of Bush is the most profound, and a whole bushel of hot dog morsels won’t make it go away.
Here is a list of all the bad things I think Bush will do if he’s elected:
1. Send increasingly large numbers of troops to Iraq.
2. Attack Iran, Syria, etc.
3. Institute a draft (see 1. and 2., above).
4. Appoint right-wing judges, especially to the Supreme Court.
5. Ramp up the Patriot Act.
6. Continue to decimate environmental regulations with legislation like the “Clear Skies Initiative.”
7. Continue to decimate education (“No Child Left Behind”).
8. Pass more ludicrously-named legislation (see 6. and 7.)
9. Continue to bankrupt our treasury with wars and tax cuts.
10. Continue to under-fund domestic (“Homeland”) security.
11. Outlaw abortion.
12. Continue to erode human and civil rights, including the institution of a “Gay Marriage Ban.”
13. Further alienate the rest of the world.
My fears about guns and my fears about Bush have melded together in my mind. This makes sense: if it weren’t for people like Bush, we would have gun control, including identification measures so that the bullet in our hallway could be easily traced.
Locked in my house, I comfort myself with the knowledge that even if someone took another shot at us, they probably wouldn’t hit anyone, because the angle from the street is, as one of our neighbors pointed out, not optimal.
But when it comes to Bush, you can cringe in your fragile home with the lights out, peering out the window and going “Woo-woo-woo,” but if he wins, there will be no place on earth left to hide.
So if you were driving down my street the other night and happened to notice a shiny object flying into my window like a strangely powerful insect, please call the police and tell them what you can. And if you are old enough to vote, please vote for John Kerry—I know you like Ralph Nader, but he can’t win.
Whatever else you say about Kerry, and I believe there are good things to say, it is clear that he is Not Bush. (For details, visit www.johnkerry.com.) In 2000, many people said there was no difference between Bush and Gore, but I think we’ve found out that there was a difference. I shudder to think what we might find out in the next four years if Bush is elected.
Meanwhile, I will be cowering here, under the kitchen table, listening for strange sounds, a faint whistle and then shattering glass. Henry will be on the floor beside me, with Squirrel-dog, eating hot dog morsels and sounding the alarm for all of us. We’re still afraid—we’re very afraid—but we’re working on it.
1 “Pied Beauty”
