My dog died two weeks ago. It came upon us suddenly. We had less than a month from taking her into the vet for weightloss and vomiting from when we let her go. We had had her for about two years. It was more than enough time. As I think back on my pets, and the loss of pets I know that a pet-person relationship is intensely personal. No one else can appreciate your loss because the pet does not have the means or the desire to be intensely social and develop multiple relationships. The pet selectively chooses a few folks to be his/her own pack and gives everything to them. I understood this and had more than once tried to articulate this to others when they lost their pets. Letting Milli go yesterday, I found myself rifling through memories of her. What stands out are the imperfections – the things that make her unique. The things that only we would know about because we spent so much time with her within the confines of our home. Her drool, her constantly dirty ears, the way that she would look at you directly in the eye checking in to make sure that you were on the same page. She was not obedient per se, but saw the relationship as a partnership. She would use a sharp bark to tell you that something needed to change – she needed to go outside, or she needed her bed fluffed or there was a cat annoying her. The first night she joined us she would not stop those barks. We thought for sure she was going to have to go back to the foster family. Now I see that we were doing something wrong, and she was trying to let us know. We benadryled her and fumbled our way through a week before we all began to learn each others’ imperfections and peculiarities.
Our dogs each of the three that we’ve had have cost us a bit in medical bills. They’ve had issues of all forms, cancer, glaucoma, auto-immune diseases, torn ligaments, rotting teeth, infected pads, allergies, dog aggression, separation anxiety, you name it. We began referring to them as “lemons.” If you’ve ever had a ‘lemon’ car, you know that they have a personality and a set of peculiarities. You might have to perform certain rituals or mechanics to get the automobile to perform. Our lemons have been similar, but like wabi sabi something so special emerges from those peculiarities.
Thinking about imperfections and home, I started considering our own imperfections and presentation of those to others. Growing up we often had multiple sets of something: the nice set and the usable set. We had the normal plates we would use everyday and then the china we would pull out once or twice a year for special occasions. We had the stainless steel, yet slightly rusted utensils, and we had the silver. We had our sunday clothes, our school clothes and our play clothes. What we used in the confines of our home was the realistic and shabby stuff. What we wore or used in the presence of others was the best side of us. We displayed different things for different views.
Much has been written about the collapsing of identities that the web has necessitated with identity management. It’s harder to show one face to one collective of people and another to a different set of people. You have to be prepared for your former sunday school teacher to see a photo of you drunk at a party on Facebook. Your instagram account that you set up for dating may be followed by a coworker. Your flickr collection of obscene tattoos may be found by your 8th grade niece. The clothes that you wear to school are often the same that you play in in the dirt. Letting people see our imperfections can be frightening. We want people to like us, and we think that if we achieve a certain perfection that they will. Yet it’s not the sameness necessarily that makes us interesting – certainly the sameness brings us together – but what makes us sparkle and draw the eye are the differences. We should learn to cherish those things about us that are unique to us: warts, smudges, tarnish and all.