It has been a wonderful summer so far and we had the previlage of taking care of our neighbours dog "Jango" for a day while they were away. Now Jango is a wonderful dog and the envy of the neighbour hood. He is pretty young ( less than 2 years old) and is a mix of Collie and Golden Retriever.
Jango is extremely well behaved and affectionate. Pam dropped him at our place in the morning and we had our own doubts if we can handle him for the day. We put up a brave face and Pam left with a heavy heart. Jango kept watching out of the storm door for Pam to come back and get him. When he saw them drive away, he did whimper for a minute and then we felt that he was quite sad. However, he was quiet and well behaved and sat in a corner.
Jango is a rescued dog. I gather that his previous owner was a convict and Jango was given up at some point of time or rescued due to cruelty. Pam had just lost her Labrador of twelve years and was heart broken and adopted Jango. That was just six months ago.
In those six months, Jango has bonded well with Pam and has probably been able to forget the trauma of the past. In the early days he was afraid of men, especially ones in black trench coats. Now he is quite comfortable amidst friends and strangers alike.
I watched him as he sat in the corner ocassionally closing his eyes and responding whenever his name was called. He seemed to have taken life the way it was unfolding. this is where I got my definition of animal existance.
We live in the same time and space, but Jango is perfectly happy and comfortable looking at the blades of grass, the bumble bees, the birds and the sky! I dont know what he was thinking all the time, but Jango was at peace. Jango loves every one, is trusting to a great extent and brings joy to every one around him.
I think we could take a leaf from his book and start trying to cut through the noise in our lives and get a firm focus on what is important. I think these days we are driven towards materialism and to support the materialism, we work as hard as possible and in the process we are preoccupied by a virtual world that has no relation to the real world.
The real world consists of our family, the nature around us and what we want to experience in our life. We only live once and we really need to make the most of it. I remember a song that goes some thing like "Live like you are dying". If you just had 3 months to live, what would you do with your life? would you be hunched up behind a computer working away on that important project or would you rather get away from it all and lead an idyllic animal existance? May be I learnt something from Jango already.
Sunday, August 24, 2008
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