The author and humorist Leo Rosten once said of W.C. Fields, “Anyone who hates dogs and babies can’t be all bad.” Your author, for what it’s worth, prays that Dr. Rosten was right. No, dear reader, he does not hate dogs and babies. However, what he intends on saying here will likely be interpreted as such. Of late, there has been a proliferation of canine companions on campus. There has also been an alarming alliterative accretion in the columns of your humble author, but that is another column. However, where there are dogs, there is – how does one decorously say? – the detritus of dogs.
Now, your author doesn’t quite see what is so complicated about this. If Fido, Rex, Boniface, or whatever they call dogs these days leaves a present, then the gentlemanly thing to do would be to collect it and dispose of it properly. On the off chance that your author has to go from Pioneer Chapel to Trippet Hall, he would really rather not have to walk as though he were in the DMZ. The students of Wabash College will likely have gendarmes on the Mall soon enough: they (we) should try to keep it as clean as possible.
There is another reason to keep the grass as pristine as possible. Here at Wabash College, grass is important. Your author’s column of last semester detailed how the football staff evicted a blood drive from the fieldhouse, lest the precious Kentucky bluegrass be despoiled. You probably have read, earlier in this very newspaper, that there is another blood drive very soon. If we abuse our grass with the remnants of Ralston-Purina puppy chow, then I shudder to think what will happen to the spiritual heirs of Florence Nightingale. We may have to use that blood at home.
Also, it’s a little Marge Schott to let dogs run rampant over campus. When she wasn’t saying things that would embarrass Strom Thurmond, she was not exactly the epitome of classy behavior. Far, far from it.
Your author has been told that dogs are a Wabash tradition. The Phi Delts had a splendid tradition of canine residence; I think they preferred either bulldogs or Sts. Bernard, but that came to an unfortunate end. Such, as the French say, is liability in an exceedingly litigious society. Your author thinks a couple of other houses have dogs, or at least dogs in residence. Not sure what College policy on the matter is, though, he will refrain from naming names. While he doesn’t care one way or the other what people say or think of him, even he thinks that having people’s pets taken away is a bridge too far. Also, it’s more than a little Wizard of Oz. In any event, dogs are part of Wabash.
Still, if the mission statement means anything, Wabash men should act responsibly with their four-legged emotional uppers. Dogs, as your author was reminded growing up, are like children. Children that can run alarmingly fast, bite very hard, and carry all sorts of nasty diseases – like rabies. They are, then, probably not like children; however, the analogy is necessary to carry through the second phase of your author’s argument. No parent with any sense would let their child run wild, doing what they pleased when they pleased, and attempt to justify it. Perhaps fifty years ago, below the Mason-Dixon line, that was the case. However, this is Indiana in 2007.
Dogs, your author supposes, are nice creatures with a lifespan that won’t cramp one’s style. It’s all fun and games until some child gets mangled, and then – well – Americans have two pastimes: baseball and litigation. I sincerely doubt that a nice game of catch will assuage the helicopter parents of little Johnny or Susie. A trip to Montgomery County Circuit Court, though, will likely do just fine. That’s an extreme example, but no one thinks that Fido, Gustav, or Zeke would attempt some cross-species plastic surgery with his jaws until he does. Your author isn’t saying be paranoid and weird about letting people play with your dog, dear reader. However, there are times to think critically and act responsibly with things that – not too terribly long ago in the evolutionary mists – enjoyed roaming in packs with the intent of killing things.
To the matter at hand, dogs are great (if you’re into that whole emotionally needy, non-productive, drain on resources thing) – but they make terrific messes. Let’s all be gentlemen, and let’s clean up after our allied mammals and ourselves. Like everything else at Wabash, it seems that student freedoms are doled out until there is an excuse to retract them. If that is the case, and your author believes that it is, then in the interest of the freedom to have canine companionship (and every other freedom that Wabash men currently enjoy) to tend to the most loveable of the lower beasts.
It’s also in the interests of the footwear of Wabash men. Sandal season is almost upon us, and, God forbid, but let’s think about what that incident might do to an otherwise-splendid day.