The Raging Elitist

Do dogs get embarrassed? Every now and again, on the rare occasion that Sammy has an accident in the house, or perhaps after being caught trying to eat off the kitchen counter, I see something like shame written on her face. Maybe her concern is purely hedonic, but maybe it’s moral. She does seem to have principles. One way she demonstrates them is through her efforts to keep her humans on an even keel. Upset humans are to be followed, wagged at, rubbed against, and generally consoled. There is to be peace and harmony in the household, and when Sammy’s rule-breaking creates an unwanted increase in volume, it’s cause for shame.

Of course, shame isn’t exactly embarrassment. Embarrassment has less to do with morality and more to do with appearances, something that concerns Sammy little. Sammy is so nonchalant about her self-image that she doesn’t care who’s watching when she hops up on the couch and starts licking her own asshole. Good luck trying to make her blush.

Young children are similar to dogs in their immunity to embarrassment. I remember taking Cartter to kindergarten late one day following a constipation episode at the house. After his initial bout of screaming on the toilet, we spent the first part of the morning forcing fluids, running, and doing calisthenics, ultimately achieving the desired outcome in the form of multiple large movements. Presenting him at the doorway of his classroom, I explained to the teacher that he was “a little constipated this morning.” I figured that was discrete enough. 5-year-olds don’t know the term “constipated.” I didn’t account for the curiosity factor, though.

“What’s constipated?” came a voice from in the middle of the cluster of children seated on the floor for story time.

Taking this as his cue, Cartter took a step further into the room to address his classmates. “It’s when poop gets stuck. In your butt,” he loudly proclaimed, using his index finger to indicate the direction in which the poop gets stuck, that is, up. I was proud that he felt so free to share.

Sadly, with age comes ego development, and bigger egos cast bigger shadows; I mean those not-so-becoming counterparts to our conscious selves, the part that doesn’t match up with how we want to be seen, the stuff we reflexively repress, the stuff that makes us embarrassed and ashamed. I doubt that Cartter would be so open with his second-grade classmates when it comes to his bowel movements or lack thereof. Unlike Sammy or his kindergarten self, he is image-conscious now.

In recent weeks I’ve noticed Cartter’s growing sense that certain things are supposed to be “private,” one of them being emotional wounds suffered at the hands of his peers. “You write these things, and then you send them to all your adult friends,” he said, as we walked through the Old Village behind his mommy and Scotty. We were enroute to the ice cream shop, and he’d just let on that he had a secret and that he didn’t think he’d tell it to me. Until I said the magic word.

“No,” I said. “Some stories I mark private.” This changed everything. Cartter’s spine straightened, and his eyes widened like he’d just received a little jolt of electricity. Then he told me about the latest incident involving some kid being a total dickhead. Thoughts of what to say charged around in my mind like wild horses, but I reigned them all in, all except, “Sounds like that kid is kind of a dick.”

“Kind of,” Cartter murmured staring at the ground, and we continued slowly down the sidewalk, sunlight filtering through live oak leaves and glittering all around us.

Sammy demonstrates a similar reluctance when it comes to showing weakness. She’ll make a big deal about getting her ears cleaned or stepping on a sweetgum ball, but when she explodes a ligament in her knee, she acts like nothing happened. She bounds about on three legs with a ball in her mouth, eager for you to chase her. Only when she’s been marked by a heavy wrap does she change the way she goes about her business. Still, she doesn’t seem embarrassed. She skips right past embarrassment to utter despondence. Once others take action in response to her pain, she has failed, and she sulks. It was supposed to be private, you see.

I admire Sammy’s stoicism, even if it is really born of self-preservation instincts. It pairs nicely with her single-mindedness about how one ought to live – playfully and exuberantly. To be injured is to not play, and to not play is to die. In a sense, Sammy’s self-image is inseparable from her desire to live an ideal life, and that’s something worth protecting. I’m afraid that humans’ protection of self-image is different, though, that it has less to do with living well, and more to do with looking good. I’m not exceptional in this regard.

My vanity follows me around like my own asshole, out of sight but ever-present, and occasionally irritated and inflamed. Now that I’m nearing 40 and largely sedentary, my vanity and my asshole are getting harder to ignore, and if I want to preserve anything approaching Sammy-like ideals of joy in life, I have to sacrifice the former and tend to the latter, privacy and embarrassment be damned.

Maybe asshole pathologies are nature’s way of teaching humility. They’re not for young people. One needs to have faced down some of that repressed psychic material and to have acquired a certain degree of acceptance in order to speak frankly about his hemorrhoids with a medical professional and not be overcome by embarrassment. In this my 40th year, I learned that I am largely capable of doing just that, and as I approached the drive-through window at the pharmacy, I was feeling pretty good about it. I even contemplated paying the pretty young pharmacist a compliment before thinking, “I wonder if she knows what’s in that bag.” When I pulled forward and looked down at the label, the instructions, clearly and boldly printed in all caps, seemed to stare right back at me as if in response to my question: “APPLY TO RECTUM 3 TIMES DAILY FOR ANAL PAIN.” Despite the anal pain, I couldn’t help but laugh sitting there alone in the driver’s seat. I only wish that when I took the bag, I could have smiled and said, “Hope this stuff does the trick!” I imagine it would have been freeing, that it would have been in keeping with the Sammy way of living.

Sammy doesn’t need to practice being open and honest. Unfortunately, I do, and what better place to start than in private, absent the fear of embarrassment. When Cartter and I got another moment alone on our walk, the conversation again turned to the dickhead kid. Neither of us were sure of the best way to handle the matter, but I told Cartter that sometimes when something is bothering me, I write about it, and I write as if I were explaining it to someone. If I do a good job trying to make the other person understand, I end up understanding better myself. He liked the idea. Another little jolt of electricity shot through him, and he said, “Then it could be private, just for me.” Yes, until you post it on your blog.

When I told Cartter’s secret to Danyelle later, a flash of anger passed over her face before sadness set in. “I don’t want him to get picked on,” she said.

“It’s fine,” I told her. “Everyone gets picked on. I got picked on. He’s already doing better than I did, though. He’s talking about it,” which is something Sammy can’t do, just like she can’t overcome embarrassment that doesn’t exist, or resist counter surfing and the resultant shame. Being human and self-conscious about one’s asshole does have certain advantages.