Things Break

You might think that when I'm appearing to sleep as I lay outside the motorhome for hours on end that I'm just sleeping. You'd be wrong because I do a lot of thinking. With so much free time I think a lot about what I see and hear around me. Something I've been thinking about lately is the "things" that humans have.

I'm not sleeping. I'm thinking about things.

Us dogs come into life with only the hair on our backs, go through our life with scarcely any more than that and leave with that same hair firmly attached. Humans come into life without that hair, leave with slightly more hair and in-between accumulate tons of “things” that appear to them to be necessary for life. What have those “things” done for humans that us dogs don’t have or don’t get to experience? The “things” come at great expense to humans. They spend most of their day working hard to get the money to buy those “things”, and most of the rest of the day using the “things” and the remainder sleeping.

When do humans have time to think about life? When do they have the time to really enjoy a beautiful sunny and scent-full day? (that’s a day with nice smells all around)

“Things” are made of materials that humans dig out of the earth, or cut off the surface of the earth and are made through various magical ways into different shapes and sizes to make noises, dig deep holes, make smelly messes, move around fast, fly through the air, and did I say, make noises? In addition, all of these “things” are continually breaking. They work for a little while making humans amazed at their own intelligence at making something so wonderful, but then they break. Then, humans swear, and scream and fret about getting them working again. They spend more time working to earn more money to get them fixed. Then, they break again, and again.

It seems that the more “things” a human has, the more time he spends working to get them fixed.

Noise making things that break.

Some examples are in order. Dad has many “things”, including many computers, lots of cameras and stuff to go with them, noise-makers (Dad calls them music-makers which include iPods, or radios, or TV’s, or stereos), things that plays what Dad calls movies, strange looking things to cook with, even something that makes a lot of noise that makes frothy liquids, things with levers that you sit on to go poop (what’s wrong with squatting where you are?) , things to tell Dad where he is that he calls a GPS (I don’t start to understand that. I’m right here and don’t need a complicated bright shiny object to tell me that!). Anyway, you get the idea. He has lot’s of “things”. And they are always breaking.

The Segway breaks.. and then where are you (on your butt).

Dad has “things” that move including, the motorhome, a car, and a thing that he glides around on called a Segway. (It’s broken right now. As it was last year this time. Dad will spend Monday trying to get it fixed and many days working to earn the money to pay the man that fixes it.) The car needs to be fixed a few times a year and so does the motorhome. Anything that moves seems to want to stop on its own and refuse to go further without Dad having to spend more money on making it go again. (What’s wrong with using your four legs to go where you want?)

All these things eventually break.

The motorhome is filled with “things” that are always breaking. Something to cook food called a microwave breaks (Why do you need to cook something anyway? It tastes best when fresh.). Something he calls a refrigerator to store food and make it cold breaks. (Cold food just doesn’t have the good smell as warm food and what’s wrong with just digging a small hole and burying your food to store it. Humans make the simplest things so complicated!) Something Mom calls an ice-maker that makes water cold and very hard breaks. Mom is always upset that it is not making ice. (To me, water tastes better when you can lap it out of a bowl and have it splash in your nose. Why make it so hard?)

My point is that Dad and Mom spend a lot of time making money to buy “things” that never seem to last for long before they have to replace them with new things or get them fixed again. Dad is always stressed about something breaking. At any one time, Dad is preparing to go somewhere to get something fixed, or is working on fixing something broke or is on the internet trying to buy something to replace something that is broke.

Just stop and smell the flowers (without any "thing" to help you).

It seems to me that humans are so busy buying “things”, using “things” and fixing them that they are missing the point of life. I don’t think life is about making a large cave filled with “things” that move and make noise. I think life is about sniffing the flowers, raising your leg on a beautiful tree, smelling the dirt, and the grass, looking up at the birds flying in the sky, digging a nice hole in the dirt, rolling around in some nice cow poop, running after cats, barking at cows, barking at the other dogs that pass by your motorhome and running with them at dog parks, lying down and relaxing and then relaxing some more when you get tired of relaxing. Humans just don’t seem to “get” life.

Stop and dig a hole. It's relaxing.

My advice to humans is to stop buying so many “things” and look around you at what mother nature has provided to you for free, without much work required other than to avoid destroying them with your “things”. All your “things” mask the natural smells, and sights and sounds, so stop using them and just be happy with those things that mother Earth has provided for you. You’ll be happier each day (and so will I).

I hope I haven’t offended too many of you with my critical assessment of your daily lives and your “things”. I know I’m a little guilty of it myself.

My one little "thing" sin. I use a laptop to write this blog.

Using this laptop computer to write about “things” doesn’t seem right, does it? But it’s my one little sin in life. Forgive me. At least I don’t have to fix it when it breaks. That’s Dad’s job.

Arf

Reggie