Four More Ounces of Responsibility
My girlfriend and I have been together for almost
five years now. As our friends get married and get dogs and have kids,
we have taken a more manageable approach to increasing commitment and
responsibility. Four months ago, for example, we got Gerbils. We’re
taking tiny steps. Sure, we’re not getting anywhere very quickly,
but we’re not tripping either.
This is not to say that gerbils are not a great responsibility. Because
we take these things very seriously, Zoot and Dingo are possibly the most
well taken care of gerbils in Montana. We learned a great deal about all
small pets allowed by our landlord before deciding on the Gerbil. They
are the cleanest of rodents, they are not active at night, they produce
very little urine and generally love people. They are also adorable.
After we had settled on gerbils we began to learn everything there is
to know about them. For example, we discovered that gerbils (as well as
hamsters) while on the shelves of every pet store in America, are rare
in their homelands. Much of their native dry prairie habitat has become
cropland, and they are hunted as pests as well as for meat (usually simultaneously).
We also discovered that a gerbil will pee when frightened, and while Zoot
and Dingo have now outgrown this, it makes picking out gerbils is a messy
process. But it’s not nearly as messy as childbirth or an ill tempered
golden retriever, and so we did not mind. We pulled out gerbil after gerbil,
getting pissed on over and over again; trying to find two who we liked
and were the same sex. We got Dingo because he was adventurous and liked
to run on the wheel; we got Zoot because he was the only other boy we
could find. But don’t tell him, he already suspects Dingo is the
favorite.
Now that we’ve been gerbil owners for some months, I can safely
say that it is a low maintenance and fulfilling duty. They are just as
much fun to watch as television and they cost significantly less than
cable. I take pride in being able to make them happy, and all they have
to do to please me is not bite. It’s nice to have unconditional
affection for something.
But owning a gerbil does not come without its hardships. Zoot once escaped
sometime in the night, and when Katherine finally found him (deep in the
junk closet) he had gone wild. After a prolonged chase she pounced and
he struck. Zoot was recaptured, but he had inflicted a bleeding bite.
From what we can tell, neither of them was permanently scarred by the
experience.
Owning a gerbil, in fact, is enough responsibility that it weighs on the
subconscious. Katherine had a dream in which Zoot and Dingo filled their
tank with thousands of squirming baby gerbils (we still worry about unplanned
pregnancies). I dreamt that Katherine gave birth to two gerbil sized children
and we had to raise them, and in another dream that I might even call
a nightmare, Dingo’s head was crushed by a stray skateboard.
It’s little wonder, with imaginations like ours, that we’re
taking it slow. We don’t avoid responsibility because we aren’t
responsible; we do it because we’re too responsible to take on any
more responsibilities.
Society is asking an awful lot of young people these days. We must educate
ourselves, obtain meaningless jobs, further our ‘careers’,
maintain a social life, remain healthy and happy, and do our best to dig
our country (and our world) out of the hole it’s being buried in.
If anyone is expecting me to have time to procreate in this environment,
they will be disappointed. And so my girlfriend and I are raising Zoot
and Dingo with the hopes that they will become good citizens who will
contribute meaningfully to our society. As always, all of our hopes lie
with the next generation, and the next generation will be gerbils.
For a full year I wrote a weekly column for a daily paper in Boulder CO. I wrote about being young, poor and green, and the column was widely loved throughout the city. It remains one of the most rewarding things I've ever done.
If you've got some time on your hands...check 'em out.
Colder than the Hinges of Hell
Four More Ounces of Responsibility