Counter-Currents
Fascist Dogs, photo credit G. F. A. Jeelvy
1,372 words
Folks, I have a tale to tell you. It’s one of those slice-of-life things, but one from which we can learn as a movement and as individuals. Last weekend, while taking a walk by the riverside, I came across a two-month-old stray puppy. Overwhelmed by concern for his well-being, I took him with me, fed him, cared for him, played with him, took him on walks, named him, and kept him until I could find a permanent home in the countryside for him two days later. It was the first time I had done anything like that. It was the first time in my life that I had a dog of my own, if even for a little while, and it was an experience which I find has profoundly transformed me.
My little furry friend required round-the-clock attention. He was too young to be toilet trained, so he might have bolted at any second to a corner to relieve himself (both number one and two were on the table). He had been on the streets for some time and so had worms, which made cleaning up his messes imperative. Probably because he was so young, he followed me everywhere and insisted on sitting with me in my armchair and sleeping with me in my bed. I did not sleep well, as he had a habit of snuggling up right next to my head on the pillow even though he was not allowed on the bed. He was also fond of peeing and pooing in the middle of the night, so I had to be on guard for his every move, lest he dropped his smelly payload in the middle of my apartment.
My little friend was stubborn and very clever. I tried walking him on a leash, but he would often refuse to move. More experienced dog owners advised me to be stricter and not afraid to tug at the leash in order to demonstrate my dominance, but others advised me not to walk this little puppy too much. Now, I take long walks — very long walks –, so whenever the puppy would get tired, I’d just carry him in my arms. When it was clear to me that he was merely disobedient, however, I would tug at his leash and inform him in no uncertain terms that it was my will that was to be obeyed. He’d often maneuver in such a way to trip me up with the leash or get me otherwise tangled up.
Now, this is probably old news to experienced dog owners, especially those who’ve kept small puppies, but for me it was an ordeal which was joy and stress at the same moment. On one hand, I cherished my very first dog. Every time he’d snuggle up next to me or fall asleep in my lap, my heart would be set aflutter. On the other, the constant scooping up of dog poop, worms included, from my fine carpets was not a pleasant experience. I confess to feeling a bit relieved when I finally found a home for my puppy. Oh, sure, it is best for him; I live in an apartment, my building has no yard to speak of, and my terraces aren’t that big. A dog needs open space and green meadows to run in. But there was a measure of relief. I’d sleep that night without the fear that poop would materialize in my bedroom.
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Why did the puppy have to sleep in my bedroom? Well, it was simple. He would whine and yap whenever I was not in the room. By picking him up on the quay, I’d become, whether I realized it or not, his primary caregiver, the alpha of his pack. I’m used to being friendly with dogs — petting them, feeding them, and playing with them — but this was the first time I had found myself in the position of being a dog’s master. I had to be strict and employ discipline. Consequently, the little creature bonded with me strongly.
I’m relating all of this because I want to prepare you for a contrasting image of myself. See, when people who know me well met me after I took in the dog, they commented that I had changed somehow. It was only after I gave him away that I realized that they were right and that the change was profound, almost magical. Mrs. Jeelvy commented that whereas I usually walk with my chest puffed out, my nose pointed upwards, and taking large steps that would make Plautus’ boastful soldier proud, after two days with the puppy, I was apparently walking small and was described as “a recently divorced Czech,” which is apparently also a riff on my penchant for wearing long coats in earthen colors (this is apparently a Czech trait).
Part of the change was probably due to fatigue and sleep deprivation, but the more important one was that which I noticed in myself — again, only after I’d given the puppy away. Normally, I’m a lazy, finicky, neurotic, and selfish person. I’m not proud of these traits, but it is who I am and have been for my 30 years. While I was caring for my four-legged friend, however, I worked tirelessly to keep him warm, entertained, fed, and clean. I picked up dog shit full of worms and scrubbed pee-stains out of carpets. I calmly and coolly disciplined him when he was misbehaving, never once losing my temper, no matter how many times he growled at me or tried to bite me. I sacrificed money, time, and my precious beauty sleep so that he’d be taken care of. And the funny thing was, there was no process of overcoming, no period of adjustment. I picked the puppy up by the riverside, and from that moment on, I was no longer a lazy, finicky, neurotic, and selfish person, but a hard-working, calm, and selfless caregiver for an animal in need. The change was so seamless I didn’t even notice it until after I’d given the puppy away to a better home. It just . . . happened.
I was reminded of a time when the electricity went out in my whole city. It was still daytime when it happened, so I picked up a book to keep myself entertained while waiting for the power to come back on. Normally, I have trouble concentrating on books, because I’m distracted by the Internet. With that temptation removed, I achieved the kind of immersion I used to have back before ubiquitous Internet access. Of course, when the power came back on, I was back to staring at screens — but all it took was that brief interruption.
We like to complain about the effects of modernity, and we’re right to do so, because they are evil, but let me advance a bold opinion: Modernity’s behavioral modification pressures are weaker than our ancient instincts. I noticed that when I was caring for my puppy, I didn’t even think about looking at my phone. It was like that damned infernal device wasn’t even there, even as it rudely vibrated in order to catch my attention.
Furthermore, I didn’t go through a long period of preparation so that I’d be “ready for a dog.” I just picked one up off the street and transformed into a person “ready for a dog” in that very instant. I imagine something very similar would happen if I were to suddenly become a father. It wouldn’t be a question of whether I’m “ready,” but my parental instincts would be activated the second it happened. Fatherhood is not something you learn from a book, but a position informed by our ancient genetics.
That’s the moral I will leave you with. When the time comes, you will be ready, because the key to these things is already within you. If I have it in me to pick up poop and be strict with a two-month year old puppy (just look at him), you have it in you to be a dad or a mom. It’s not a test you can cram for, but a transformation which must be undergone; a kind of initiation.
You’re ready for it. Take the leap.
* * *
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24 comments
Not a word I often think of after reading a Jeelvy piece, but, “beautiful.”
You think my other pieces are bad?
Of course not. But they mostly deal with difficult and unpleasant issues on a large scale, politics and race and violence and conflict. While insightful and well written, they are not “beautiful” the way this piece of yours is, a change in your soul by encountering a small lost animal, and the opening to life it created.
Completely off topic, but I am curious to learn Mr. Jeelvy’s opinion of L. Guyenot’s recent article over at Unz Review, “A Byzantine View of Russia and Europe,” assuming he has read it.
I skimmed it briefly and I found it full of the typical Western ignorance about the East. Moscow is not “the third Rome” and Russians would be better off if they stopped trying to be something they’re not.
From the conversion of Rus to the time of Peter the Great, they tried to be Byzantines. From Peter the Great to the time of the Bolsheviks, they tried to live as Westerners. During the Bolshevik/Soviet period, they hewed themselves to Jewish Marxism and from 1991 on, they’ve tried desperately to be America. Spengler would call this pseudomorphy. Traces of authentic Russianism exist under it, we find them in Dostoyevski and Mussorgsky, and they’re usually the elements of Russian culture most alien to us as either Westerners or post-Byzantines. Personally, I’d like to see Russians trying to be Russian for a change.
I’ll also add that Pootin and his gang of criminals are not the carriers of the Russian civilization whose ascendance has been predicted by Spengler.
Some more details about the “third Rome” mental issue.
This story was sold by the Greek monks to different powerful, rich, and vain men in order to get the necessary gold for their projects on the Athos Mount, Constantinople, Jerusalem, Damascus, and probably others. It was said that the gold was necessary to keep the Christian faith alive in the lands under Ottoman occupation.
In fact, almost any country in Europe have a good case for this title, including France. But probably the atheistic France would not pay a dime to the talented Mr Guyenot, while Russia would eagerly do that. Nothing new here.
Since 1600, many Orthodox Christians were heavily salivating for the promised Russian gold, so they started to pave the way to Moscow via Putivli. During those years the greatest ever espionage and propaganda network was born (only to be inherited by the soviets).
The ravings of Filofei of Pskov, and Ivan IV (the Terrible), “The Legend of the White Cowl”, combined with bankruptcy of southern European good for plucking pheasants made the entire Orthodox circus to move to Moscow.
One of the most plucked pheasants, on his name Vasile Lupu of Moldavia, started a “financial audit” for the gold he had lavishly spent for Athos and Jerusalem. Unhappy with such uppity bicephalous pheasant (you know what I mean), the Greek Patriarch from Constantinople had some talks with Mehmet IV. Thereupon the pheasant lost the throne of Moldavia in 1653 and died few years later at Yedikule Fortress. Intelligent, cultured, but vain. As vain as his in-law, the brave Bohdan Khmelnytsky (practically the originator of the current madhouse in Europe). As endearing as Taras Bulba.
SO it’s funny how awestruck are many westerners by this third Rome story tellers, trying to put a mystical dress on a classic tale of greed, intrigue, web of lies, and tragedies.
Somebody even asked rhetorically what makes the Russian culture great. It is its escapism. In a maddening reality you need an escape to maintain a semblance of sanity. That’s the Russian culture. The Russians may stay among themselves to rave and write the best novels in the world. but keep in mind, these are not for everyone. It is the great danger of assuming these are real. (While the Jews may write the best game theory books). I do prefer Swiss chocolate, thank you very much.
The most escapist Russian literature is the one that is the most strongly pseudomorphous, imitating either German/English or Greek/Byzantine forms (Nikolai Gogol, Evgeni Zamyatin, Daniil Kharms, Alexei Tolstoy, the Futurists). The most authentically Russian literature (Dostoyevsky, Solzhenitsyn, Chekhov) is re-centering, realistic and gloomy. Even Chekhov’s comedies are gloomy in their humor. In music, you see it in the difference between Westerner Tchaikovsky and Russian Mussorgsky.
When the foreign-souled Russians write, they write to escape, to transcend. Alexei Tolstoy’s Los builds a spaceship to travel to Mars, just so he can escape the earth, the great sprawling plain of Mother Russia. Kharms retreats into surrealism and absurdism to escape the levelling horror which despises eccentricity. Zamyatin conjures up psychic escape, rebellion through hedonism and exceptionalism to the levelling effects of totalitarian society, culminating in martyrdom.
When the Russian-Souled Russians write, they write to accept. Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov and Ivan Denisovich accept their fates, such as they are. Raskolnikov rejects his pseudomorphy, rejects his Deutschentum, rejects Petersburg in order that he may become a more perfect Russian.
This is analogous to fundamentally Apollonian Italians trying furiously to break out of the Faustian paradigm by re-establishing the cult of the body during the Renaissance.
You don’t listen…
As a wise man said, “be it, at their own homes”.
The true Russian soul seeks the acceptance of the world of its own making. The fake Russian soul seeks to escape the world of its own making. The later is pushing Russian misery down to the former’s throat while this is one is trying hard to run.
Either case, there are not enough vacancies in the Swiss sanatoriums for so many Idiots, frankly the sole true escape. They both are idiots. Because they try to accept the unacceptable or they try to take refuge in imagination (or other cultures). While none tries to do something useful.
My take is that the poor Russian writes literature, the rich Russian buys a home in the Swiss Alps. Like Vova Putin for his Tatar mistress and kids, while his tanks are looking like they entered the Zone without a “Stalker”. Because Blokhin killed him for Faustian tendencies of course. Spooky Tarkovsky predicted the future twice in the same movie.
So Nick, drop the gloom and the Russian great literature trap. You are still young. Enjoy life.
How would you characterize Scriabin? I don’t listen to classical music as much as I should, but when I do, I go for Scriabin’s piano works.
Another Russian descended from the Swiss Alps, trying to save the world without being asked for that. Just like my answer, sorry. At least he wasn’t trying to exterminate anyone.
Guess Sviatoslav Richter played Scriabin the best.
The young Rostovs savour the local dishes while someone in the background is playing on the balalaika. Uncle asks Anisya to bring his guitar and it turns out that he can play very well. His Russian notes hit Nicholas and Natasha straight in the heart. Every time a song finishes, Natasha begs Uncle to play another. The music becomes livelier, and Uncle gets up and challenges Natasha: he expects her to dance Russian style. But Natasha was raised by a French governess and learned to dance at Iogel’s. Nonetheless she dances as if she has always danced like that, conveying with every movement that Russian feeling, that is inimitable, that you have to have inside you, and that Natasha apparently breathed in together with the Russian air, in spite of her foreign upbringing. Anisya, who is watching from the door opening with the rest of the staff, is moved to tears.
I think you’re ready for a family, Luv. Have at it! You have a wonderful voice, and a patient, calm demeanor that comes across in your interviews on Writer’s Bloc.
I’ve had two wonderful Dachshunds but lost both to my own stupidity. The first because I began dating, and foolishly living with, a man who didn’t like dogs, and I was too late picking up on that. The dog ‘escaped’ the yard and ‘got hit’. The second, some 30+ years later, because I had to return to work after living on saved money for a year with my new dog and had to leave her with neighbor. Also, escaped and never found. The two worst memories of my life, but the fun of walking them and having them somehow ‘sneak’ up onto the bed every night, is indeed unforgettable joy.
Doxies have a heart of gold and I still tear up every time I think about my old boy and our last walk together. I might have to get a different breed next because he’s irreplaceable, not an exaggeration to say he saved my life in so many ways.
And now I’m crying and laughing at the same time because you reminded me of something I hadn’t thought of in a long time. As you know they’re notoriously stubborn and despite the fact that I religiously took mine on long walks every single day – so long that I found myself often carrying him on the way back many times, tail still wagging like mad and tongue fully out – he kept finding ways to run away from our yard dozens and dozens and dozens of times. If someone would leave the gate the tiniest bit open and unattended for more than five seconds you could basically start praying. I found myself running like a mad man shouting for him on every street corner from the top of my lungs too many times to count and I thanked my lucky stars every time I found him safe in our regular spot since there was one very busy intersection on the way. I think it’s nothing less than a miracle he wasn’t taken away from me in the same way. If there’s such a thing as a guardian angel he was fully aware of just how badly I needed that dog.
My point is try not to beat yourself too hard about it and you’re by no means the only one who made these sort of mistakes. I neglected my first dog and I was a far bigger idiot since that dog also had a different special meaning for reasons too personal to even begin to get into.
We truly don’t deserve them.
Thanks for sharing your ‘adventures’ with Doxies, and I hope you’re still young enough to take on another. I may look for an older dog from a Doxie rescue group. I remember my dear mother at home for a couple years because of illness, and how all four of her Doxies all ended up in her bed all day. However, whenever my dad put the food out in the kitchen, they all launched into that room. They certainly helped her last year. Many good memories indeed.
A heartwarming article in the midst of all this negativity is certainly appreciated. I’ve never owned a dog, but care deeply for the ones my friends and family own. Pets have a tendency to bring out the good in people, and the changes you described in yourself are something I can relate to after taking care for a loved ones pet.
Dr. Ex is right; this is beautiful. Furthermore, I do not believe in coincidences. The creator of the universe Himself put that puppy by the riverside for you to find.
Your consternation with turning 30 has puzzled me, and now I wonder if Mr. Puppy has changed that feeling for you, too. Maybe you didn’t think you were “ready” yet, so turning 30 seemed like you should have felt more so?
If you walk that much, the size of your apartment really doesn’t matter. Your future good-boy will have all of outdoors with dad.
Guy possessed by small furry creature for 2 days, insists he owns his owner, has fantasies about being the alpha of the pack, etc.
Balkan politics, in a nutshell.
Well, there were no war crimes, at least.
Unless one considers runny worm infested excrement to be a war crime? Having been a puppy shepherd before I became a father I can relate to the instinctual ability to cope and nurture. I was only moderately successful in either role, but it does have its long term rewards. Puppies grow out of bladder control problems as do children. Dogs then slather you with unconditional love for life. Children we hope can carry on our name and do us proud. I have been slowly feeding my son bits and pieces of the obvious displacement of whites in our society and he’s becoming more aware. He even mentioned how daft a white college girl on tiktok was for claiming that eating meat is racist. Because slaves didn’t get enough meat. He is aware enough to recognize the sheer idiocy. Oh and my Scotties were definitely racist. They growled and barked at blacks passing on the street. And were great protectors of our homefront.
I think everyone could use a lighthearted wholesome read at this particular time. While it is a beautiful piece indeed, unfortunately it made me sad reminiscing. I don’t know how my life would’ve turned had I been deprived of man’s best friend during what was one of my darkest nights of the soul yet. For a while it was the only lifeline I had to some remnants of sanity in this mad world.
You shouldn’t shrug off the idea of owning a dog altogether just because you’re confined to an apartment. There are breeds of all sizes which do just fine even if neither of you work from home provided you can set aside the necessary time for walks, which it sounds like you do.
A couple I know in this situation got a large breed specifically because they live in an enriched area where a couple of break-ins had been reported and so the missus can jog in peace given the threat posed by the relatively recently imported fauna destroying all civilization in its path.
Another thing to keep in mind from I’ve heard is that caring for a baby and puppy at the same time can be a really bad idea so you should consider getting the puppy first if you’re inclined to do so at all.
Best wishes to your future family, human and canine alike. Not that I mean to put any kind of pressure, it sounds like you’re ready and urging others to do the same. I’m in a similar age range and the yearning for both can get far too overwhelming at times. Don’t forget there’s no such thing as counting your blessings too often.
“Modernity’s behavioral modification pressures are weaker than our ancient instincts. I noticed that when I was caring for my puppy, I didn’t even think about looking at my phone.”
Too optimistic. I have children and still feel the pull of my phone and other distractions. And these distractions are constantly getting stronger because the tech world is constantly optimizing to better addict us.
“I was reminded of a time when the electricity went out in my whole city. It was still daytime when it happened, so I picked up a book to keep myself entertained while waiting for the power to come back on. Normally, I have trouble concentrating on books, because I’m distracted by the Internet. With that temptation removed, I achieved the kind of immersion I used to have back before ubiquitous Internet access.”
Ha, exact same thing happened to me. This shows that the only solution is to completely lock down your devices. Decide beforehand exactly what content you will permit and fix a schedule. Enforce it with apps that lock things down. You will fill like a superman. I went from being able to get nothing done to easily (35 hour work week) establishing and selling a multi-million dollar business.
But whenever I get confident that I have the addiction beat and relax, it comes roaring back.
A possibility would be to live in a community with no private access to games and internet distraction. If you want to use a computer, you go to a public center, like a library and do your reading and work there.
Well done: compassion for the beings in our care holds true worth. Contrast that with the ‘telescopic philanthropy’ of the Left and their perpetual clamour for Western nations to absorb endless waves of unassimilable incomers.
Beautiful column. I am reminded of what our kind host says about Christmas; the holiday is like dogs in that it brings out the best in people.
I just realized that living in an apartment is not such a bad thing in that it almost forces one to go for long walks. In my big house, I often just stay indoors or seek the backyard at best.
The protective instincts that intensify when we have a child actually starts at conception. The man protects his wife and unborn child until birth. The mother cleans up the house like there’s no tomorrow over and over again.
I wish the author many happy, healthy children. A read of Shakespeare’s sonnets may assist to push a man to fatherhood.
This article captures its subject perfectly. Beautifully done, Nick. I’ve raised 4 pups in my life (I’m 30). Their “humanizing” effect is precisely as described. I have a deep interest and passion for dogs, and I’ll pen an article on it sometime. Dog-breeding is one of the great treasures of our European heritage.
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