Along for the ride

I go out for a walk. I pass other people walking like me. My head picks up the pace of my legs and shakes off the stillness of being indoors. Along the way, wild ideas cross paths with ongoing plans. A lot of “what if I add this to that?”, at a level as ridiculous as putting dulce de leche, our caramel spread, on spaghetti.

I was in the middle of that when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a van and a dog in the back, looking out the window. I kept walking, but the dog got into my head and stayed there.

A dog along for the ride.

I thought about the times I’d seen myself like that. Just existing, not putting dulce de leche on anything, making no attempt to change the situation, because the situation wasn’t doing me any apparent harm. Apparent. That’s the point.

I ran back about thirty meters. A train had the street blocked and the van was waiting, still, with the dog and its owner inside. I crossed, knocked on the glass and asked if I could take a photo.

I didn’t know what I wanted it for. I did know what I was looking at: a place I never want to go back to. In Argentina we have a phrase for it, comerse los mocos, literally eating your own boogers. It means putting up with something you don’t like without lifting a finger.

When I was a student, I lived on a shoestring, week to week. I’d had to move in a hurry to an apartment downtown, central but a bit run-down, and the rental agency could smell my desperation: they made the rules. One day the water heater broke. I went to complain and they told me they’d already bought a new one, that I should pick it up at the store and take it to the apartment myself, so they could install it.

I was paying rent on a place that came with a water heater. Fixing it was their problem. I see that now. That day I didn’t.

A friend told me: “Listen, you need to sort this out. I’ll come with you.” One Monday, around nine at night, we went to the store and picked up one of the tall ones, nearly five feet. He carried it on his shoulder for two blocks to my place. I walked beside him. I knew something was wrong with all of it, but I didn’t want to cause more trouble. I had that feeling you get

when you press your lips together, close your eyes, raise your eyebrows and lift your shoulders in a clear gesture of resignation.

The crossing gate was still down. On the other side of the glass, the dog was along for the ride. When the van pulled away, it would take him somewhere and he’d arrive without having decided anything. No choosing, no direction of his own.

The brain saves energy. It repeats the usual path even if you show it another one, and if the usual one doesn’t hurt, it has no reason to wake up.

The dog is a dog. And I saw the scene from the outside.