[2Wycked]

Futurama is a great TV show and I will eventually do a writeup on the show, as I always re-watch the series every Christmas season - you know me, I'll find a red-pill/conservative theme. However, consider it's best episode, "Jurassic Bark."

The basic premise of Futurama is a dorky & dumb pizza delivery driver named Fry who gets frozen in a cryogenic lab for 1000 years. He is revived in the 31st century. The show lampoons many contemporary problems through this lens. He works with an elderly relative named Dr. Farnsworth, a one-eyed woman named Leela and a robot named Bender.

You can watch the episode here:

http://www.watchcartoononline.com/futura...assic-bark

The main character, Fry, goes with his best friend robot, Bender, to a museum exhibit where Fry spots a fossilized dog that he recognizes as a dog he had as a pet when he lived in the 1990's. He protests for a number of days in order to get his fossilized dog, Seymour, back.

Throughout the rest of episode, flashbacks to his days as delivery driver are displayed. Fry met Seymour through his job and he & Seymour immediately took to one another and were completely inseparable at work. One flashback shows that after Fry disappeared (got frozen) Seymour led Fry's parents to Fry in the lab, but his parents dismissed the yapping of Seymour and didn't recognize the frozen Fry.

He takes the fossilized dog to Dr. Farnsworth, who informs Fry that he can revive Seymour with his original memories. Fry rejoices and, as previously mentioned, he rejoices at the thought of being reunited with his best friend.

His robot friend, Bender, is irrationally jealous and at the last moment before Seymour is revived, Bender seizes the dog and launches the dog a volcano pit in order to destroy Seymour. Fry is rightfully livid and Dr. Farnsworth informs Bender that the dog is possibly still intact in the lava. After realizing his error, Bender bravely dives into the lava and rescues Seymour intact.

Dr. Farnsworth puts Seymour on the cloning machine, which informs everybody that Seymour lived to age 15. Fry sadly stops the process, claiming that Seymour lived a full life and probably forgot about him long ago.

Quote:

I had Seymour until he was three. That's when I knew him, and that's when I loved him. I'll never forget him. But he forgot me a long time ago.

A flashback shows this is not true, however:

The ending to the episode is one of the saddest endings to a TV show. It highlights the loyalty animals can have to their owners and how uncomplicated the relationships are with the lack of human being's vagaries and fickleness. Seymour represents a level of loyalty and love most of us humans will never know.

While I have heard of many studies that extol the benefits of pet ownership, I am no expert nor familiar with them so I won't cite any. I will however, consider America's atomized and narcissistic society in light of pet ownership.

While it is true that America is a narcissistic society, it manifests itself in a few ways that leads people to developing relationships with pets.

First, is the superficiality of modern society at large. Facebook, Twitter and the vast swath of social media do nothing to forge deep relationships. I think one of the reasons women love pets so much is they can get unconditional love from their pets that they don't get from alphas or their fellow women. Their lives are supremely superficial and, as such, their deeper emotional needs are not attended to. Hypergamy throws a wrench into these needs as beta attention is never enough.

Further, about women, is the types of pets they have. Loud dogs, like those small, annoying yappers that women often have, are mere stand-ins for the children she doesn't have. Cats represent the indifferent alphas they have in their life. I could probably do a post just on this concept on Facebook - countless women posting photos of their cat sitting on their homework, laptop or briefcase stating they can't get their work done because their cat won't let them. As for big dogs, women seem to like their strength and aggression, plus they are tamable - with respects to them. The big dogs can and will be aggressive to outsiders, yet treat her with respect and affection.

For the record, I am not so sure about women and their relationship with horses. I know multiple women who have a serious fetish with horses - no men at all. Of that demographic a good bit are narcissists - its like they are seeking to control something powerful by making the horse her subordinate. Still, the power of a horse is palpable and women are drawn to that, plus their ability to guide and refine said power.

Second, is the fear of social judgment. In narcissistic societies, people worry unnecessarily about their social comportment. Around pets, you can let your guard down and not worry about judgment. Well, maybe cats judge you. Still, you can be relaxed in ways that you cannot in society. Most assuredly, this is true in any culture, but it has different contours in narcissistic societies.



I have also seen studies that when pets die, especially for the elderly, the stress can be commensurate with pain of losing a close friend or losing a job. It is true for long term pets. I remember when my long-term pet died. I had the pet for over 10 years. It was strangely sad, as the pet had always been there. Friendly, jovial and always up for running around, roving through the woods and just general fun. When you show up one day after getting off work and their body is rotting in the hot June sun alongside a garage is tough to stomach. Sometimes, I think we take our pets for granted a good bit.

As we see in "Jurassic Bark," Fry underestimates the loyalty of his self-described best friend. I think part of that is we prioritize human relations - for real and obvious reasons - but we also, sometimes, fail to appreciate the simpler nature of animals. While part of me thinks that Fry realized that the past is often best left in the past, part of is lack of appreciating the simpler and more loyal nature of animals. This isn't a serious point, at all.

What is serious is the beauty and peace a healthy relationship with a pet can bring into a person's life. I remember going home for vacation and seeing my favorite cat I hadn't seen in some months. He remembered me straight away when I arrived at home. When drinking that night, he chilled on my lap while I conversed with people and then finished the night playing video games. Cat chilled the whole night, just purring on my lap.

The simple, uncomplicated nature of pets is amazing. One of my friends has a dog that will just hang around when we chill on his porch. You don't have to worry about a dog cock-blocking you, if anything, the dog will help you get laid if you have a positive relationship with the animal. In my experience, there is serene and calm vibe to pets like cats and dogs. Sure, they often have great energy and can run you dry, but it rarely has a negative vibe. It is always positive.

That is the beauty of having a positive relationship with a pet. It isn't rife with the issues that pervade human relationships. Their needs are easy to meet - you just need to take of their physical needs and provide positive emotional attention. Paying for feed and general pet needs mean nothing the face of the value that a pet can bring into your life. I am sad for a man who hasn't, at least once in his life, taken on a young animal and taken that animal on as a pet.

Further, a pet means something different to a man than a woman. The chasm that separates women's and pet's needs is so wide that Lindy West's fat ass could fit through with minimal amounts of lube. That highlights the value a pet can bring to a player's life - a quality companion who isn't going to shit-test you or attention whore. Especially for the red-pill man, a pet can be of great value because you don't have to worry about cruising the forum if you dog is staring at the screen like you have to do if your blue-pill white-knight friend is.



Still, losing a pet is tough. I recall that day, in the early evening, when I discovered my dead cat. I remember taking off my hat, seeing the feline body at a distance. In my gut, I new it was him. When I was right beside him, I saw his body steaming in the inglorious light of an unforgiving summer sun. Flies flickered over his body, clouding my ability to see his decaying body. I tried to wave them away, but they were so numerous I could not. I was livid and angry that these son-of-a-bitch flies couldn't leave my old friend alone. I calmed myself, knowing this the is the circle of life - we all shall perish from his earth and, often, have to bear the indignity of some mindless flies disturbing our remains.

My parents were not home that weekend, so I approached my pet's corpse on my own. I took his body and carefully moved it to the cool concrete of my Dad's garage. I specifically remember placing his body on a piece of cloth in a hidden corner of the garage - I will always remember seeing my old friend's face on that faded blue piece of cloth.

That night, I lit up and had a few beers. I wasn't supremely sad, but was very melancholy & introspective. I can't quite put a finger on it, as the losses I have experienced in life were mine outright or deaths in my family. I was just very reflective and resolved to bury him the next day.

It was a bright and sunny day the next morning. I awoke in the late morning, knowing that I would have to deal with my pet's memory now. I thought about doing some chores or playing video games. I realized that was little more than hedging behaviors and was supremely selfish considering my pet of more than a decade, whom I grew into a man with, had his body rotting in a hidden part of a garage. I retrieved my pet's body, who had decayed a bit since I found him. Seeing his old and familiar face, seeing those eyes completely glazed over was supremely tough. I took him to his favorite spot to lay down. It was in a clear part of dirt beside a massive bush or tree - I have lived at this house for just over twenty years I still don't know that this massive plant is.

I stared at the clear patch of dirt, amid some grass alongside side a woodshed. It had some gravel and branches worked into the dirt, as he laid here so often it was just a part of the dirt. I knew that I had to bury him here. I buried the shovel deep in the still moist ground of the previous nights rain. It broke quickly and evenly. I continued in this vein before I dug a hole about a foot and a half deep. I knew it was as deep as it needed to be, plus the strange tree's roots were just starting to show in the hole. I sighed to myself. I had to face the loss of my friend.

I uncovered his body from the cloth I laid over him. I knew I did that because it may have been too much for my 19-year-old self to deal with. I had recently had my car broken into and had all my money, iPod and all that jazz stolen - and then I lose my childhood pet, my friend. I looked at his dead body, his dark and layered fur intact, his big set of fangs and his hauntingly piercing eyes - it really had come to this. I lifted his limp body into the shallow grave and looked down on his helpless body in a pit of dirt. Is this what becomes of us all? Just another clump of flesh and blood with an expired set of DNA?

My mind drifted back to the last time I interacted with him - it was the previous night. I knew he was old and ill. Still, he was as lively as he could be and I recall petting him on my stoop. Hindsight is always 20/20 and I think he was overly affectionate because he knew the end was near. Maybe I am just recalling ghosts, but that is how I want to remember the interaction. Yet, when I saw a dead cat on the edge of my lawn the next day, I knew it was him.

After recalling these memories, I could feel tears rimming my eyes. I remembered playing with this cat when I was no more than 6 or 7. Here I was, a grown man, burying the same pet. There was nothing more to think or feel. I had to bury my friend. And so I did. For as long as it took me to make that hole, it was that quick to be filled up. Maybe that is the allegory of life - we spend our lives building long-term relationships that, in the end, will be wrapped up in the flick of switch.

I stared for more than a few moments at his grave. A lifetime of memories buried in a shallow grave at a house in the middle of nowhere. When my parents eventually move, it will be nothing to the people who move there. For all the emotion that was buried there, it would literally nothing more than a skeleton to those who would uncover it.

Such is life; we come into this world as bewildered as we leave it. Some lessons in life are tough to learn and losing a beloved pet is one of them. Still, like anything else in life, you can either learn from it or not. Once again, pets are important because they teach you how to learn about loss. It is much easier for a young person to learn about death through a pet than a close friend or parent. People who haven't had such a close pet will never understand it - especially you are like me and had the pet from youth into adulthood.

The importance of pets cannot be stressed enough. They can be many things to you, but the most important is the relationship you can develop with them. The domestication of animals over the course of centuries has helped tighten the bond between animals and humans, as domesticated animals have evolved to become better companions.

Notice I referred to my cat as a friend. In many ways, that is strange to me. However, I couldn't do his memory justice without describing him as a friend. He was there when my parents weren't. He was a constant in my life as I grew up.

You know, I never exchanged one iota of sentient dialogue with him. He was a fucking cat. Still, somehow, I think I had a relationship with him that was more satisfying than most human relationships.

Perhaps we humans seek satisfaction where we will never find it.

Maybe not.

[Matt3B]

Futurama is my favourite TV show of all time. That episode was based on a Japanese story of a dog called Hachikō who used to greet his owner at the train station every day. One day his owner didnt return because he had died, and the dog waited at the station for him for 9 years. He's even got a statue at the train station now.

Here's more on the story: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hachikō

Dealing with pets dying is a tough one, they feel like part of the family.

Great post.

[ryanf]

I think we develop a deep relationship with pets *because* we don't relate to them on a verbal level. Think of it like game: when you learn to communicate on a primitive level ( body language, touch, etc ), you push through human level intricacies like deceit, and simply connect. It's a deep honesty. Dogs and cats have very little forethought, very little in hindsight. They live in the now. It's everything most of us wish for: a simpler existence.

[cardguy]

Can you be an animal lover - and eat meat?

Serious question. I decided you cannot when I was about 10 - and have being a vegetarian ever since.

Personally - I think animals are more human than we are.

Since the deepest most painful feelings we have are in the hive part of the brain which we share with animals.

Things like reason and language evolved more recently in our brains.

As such - we can reason with our emotions and try and control their impact on us. Whereas animals are trapped in a world of pure intense emotions. Sadness, joy, fear, loneliness. Maybe even grief?

[Belgrano]

Great writing 2Wycked, I cried reading this. Memories...

[2Wycked]

cardguy:

Yes, absolutely you can love animals and eat meat. Most animals lovers I know are farmers that raise animals.

I don't understand how consuming animals for food means you don't love animals in general.

[ryanf]

(07-17-2013 06:06 PM)2Wycked Wrote:  

cardguy:

Yes, absolutely you can love animals and eat meat. Most animals lovers I know are farmers that raise animals.

I don't understand how consuming animals for food means you don't love animals in general.

I feel the same. I don't enjoy that an animal has to die for me to eat meat, but I gotta eat. Plants are living things too. I love pets and animals in general, but food is food.

Although if I had to capture and kill the animals in order to eat meat, I'd be considerably more torn.

[porscheguy]

I've noticed that certain women harbor a horse fetish. I remember a teacher of mine in the 8th grade having made this observation as well. That was over 20 years ago.