Sin

I wanted to write this some days back when I was mighty miffed at something. But then I knew I had no right to be pissed at the thing that did piss me off. But then such discretion is only useful as an afterthought, as an argument, as a disclaimer. Nothing more. Because knowing that is not making me any less pissed. But then anyway I decided not to dwell on it.

But something about it kept bothering me. You know, sometimes there is this nagging presence which disappears when we try to look at it directly? Something like that. Something was troubling about the whole thing.

Anyway let me get to the primary thing.

So the Valentine’s Day came and went...Blah blah. Guess a lot of things were bought and gifted as gestures of goodwill / affection or desperate attempts to impress, so on and so forth.

So let’s ask a question. What do we gift people?

Hmmmm... Not a big list isn’t it. Pens, watches, bags, clothes, jewellery, vouchers, etc...

So do you think it makes any sense to gift pups? It doesn’t now does it?

There was an article in a leading newspaper about how pups which were gifted by boyfriends/girlfriends to girlfriends/boyfriends for Valentine’s Day end up as stray dogs after some days because the person didn’t feel like wanting it or care for it after some days.

Pups are not commodities.

Pups are not stuffed toys.

Pups are not branded and do not come with a customer service hotline.

Pups cannot be put in a showcase.

Pups are not like gift vouchers which can be redeemed later.

I feel it is an extremely stupid thing to do. To gift a pup. Having a pet is as much a big decision as having a new family member isn’t it?

I thought - “But then the one who gifts can use some common sense before choosing a gift. Or maybe the receiver can at least have the prudence to say no to such a gift if they don’t think they can take care of the pup. Well anyway, so what is the big deal? There are so many street dogs anyway”.

And there ended my momentary irritation caused by reading that article.

But then something was amiss in the whole thing.

Happiness is a curious thing. I don’t know whether I have mentioned this name earlier but there is this guy Daniel Gilbert who wrote this popular science book about happiness. Yes. Science book. About happiness. Go read it if you are interested. Well anyway, in it there is this mention about these Siamese twins who rated their happiness pretty high. And when normal people were asked to comment on it, the general feedback was that it’s not possible. “Simply impossible. How can two people physically joined together be happy?”. But the truth is, they were actually, in the full sense of the word, happy. And it was so because happiness is a function of our past experiences. The Siamese twins rated their happiness in their true scale. They never knew what it feels like to be individuals and have that freedom. Qualitatively their happiness is as much joyous and as much meaningful as any of ours. Our judgement of our happiness is dependent on our collective memories and experiences and learnings.

Pups are sentient beings. Like us. Beautiful word. Sentient. Means that the entity is endowed with the capacity to feel and perceive. It is not the fact that they end up as stray dogs that is unfair. But the fact that they were cuddled, fed, shown affection and THEN thrown away. And poor things they won’t even know what wrong they did because they didn’t do any. And I don't know for how long they will keep longing for what they momentarily experienced. That IS unfair isn’t it?

And thinking about it, I suppose we are capable of doing that to even fellow humans.

Dogs? Ha. Ha. Ha.

Entha moolaiku.

To show affection and then discard someone for no mistake of theirs, I guess is one the biggest sins we can do.

God save us.