by Eric Schenck
It was just a dog.
Another day in Sayulita, Mexico, with my morning coffee on the balcony. Life was good.
The sun was about to rise. A small surf town was stirring. The big fat iguanas were starting to wake up, too.
I sit on this balcony each morning.
- Wake up at 6:15
- Make a pot of coffee
- Sit outside and observe
This is how the start of each day goes. There is a house across the street from mine. Usually, what I see is an older woman climbing down her outdoor spiral staircase.
Her routine is just as consistent as mine. There’s a coffee place around the corner. Most mornings, she’ll wake up, head to the cafe, and be walking up the stairs with her to-go cup ten minutes later. By then, I’m sipping too. It’s like a tropical version of Hitchcock’s Rear Window.
But that’s not what happened this time.
There was walking. And it was on the staircase as usual. But this time, the woman was absent. Instead, I was looking at a small white and brown circle of fur.
My neighbor across the street had been turned into a mini basset hound.
Let’s call him Stanley.
Stanley was probably about 20 pounds, and less than a foot off the ground.
What was interesting wasn’t that I was looking at a dog. It’s what Stanley was doing:
Taking the steps one-by-one, just like his owner.
Dogs in surf towns have a reputation for being lazy. They take a lot of naps. The sun is always shining, and there are plenty of foreigners to throw snacks their way.
But Stanley? He was getting his workout in early.
It was funny to watch. Mostly because of how slow Stanley moved. The first couple of steps were easy enough. Maybe one every couple of seconds. For such a small body, he was going fast.
But by the time he got a third of the way up? Every step was a separate decision. Each time Stanley reached a little higher, he was confronted with a choice: keep going, or stay stuck here. There was a battle raging inside of him. And for each step, forward progress (eventually) won out.
It was funny at first. Almost like watching a baby learn how to walk.
But then I realized that me and Stanley were not the same. This spiral staircase was the equivalent of me sprinting up a ten-story building. Impressive in its own right. I went from laughing at Stanley, to rooting for him.
I sipped my coffee, and the upward march continued.
The owner was nowhere in sight. No one to distract Stanley. But also no one to help him out. I had a front-row seat to the task at hand.
With the slow (and, dare I say, unenthusiastic) way that Stanley moved, I couldn’t help thinking of an old professor. Ancient-looking. In need of a haircut. Maybe a bit frazzled. Still in love with education, but sour on the thought of educating.
Give Stanley a pair of glasses and a tweed jacket, and the look would be complete.
You have to wonder what is going on in an animal’s head sometimes. At each step, was Stanley just mindlessly making his way to the next one? Or was he thinking “Fuck my life?” Something in the way Stanley moved told me it was the second.
By the time he reached the top third, I was no longer watching a dog making its way up a spiral staircase. Stanley had become something much more.
He was a masterclass in a struggle we all face. How much of life is trying to improve your situation? And how much of it is accepting with grace the hand you’re given?
The dog that started walking up the stairs was optimistic.
That Stanley reads self-help books. He goes to sleep at the same time every night. He is trying to optimize his life for health. For wealth. For happiness. That Stanley knew that no one was coming to save him. And that he needed to take matters into his own fluffy paws.
But the dog at the top of the spiral staircase?
That Stanley was different. More resigned. He has seen life for what it was: a struggle. A long list of things that didn’t quite turn out the way you wanted them to. And, most importantly, he was alright with that.
Stanley finally made it. And true to the show, he knew how to create suspense. It’s almost like he knew I was watching. Because this last step took the longest.
It had taken Stanley something like two minutes to make it up the first 20-odd steps. But that last one?
That’s where he paused. He simply stopped moving, and stared ahead. As I sipped my coffee, I wondered if Stanley had fallen asleep. Was this workout too much for his fat little legs?
But he made it. Finally. With all the exasperation that a fed-up mini basset hound can muster, he hopped himself to the top. I could see his mighty sigh from 200 feet away.
I was expecting Stanley to collapse in exhaustion. What he actually did? My new friend angled himself toward the road, where early morning motorcycles sped by, and sat. He stayed like that for a good ten minutes.
Tired? Probably. Satisfied? I like to think so. Stanley had overcome a challenge, and it wasn’t even 7 in the morning.
When he was done reflecting, he wiggled himself up, shook his head, yawned, and disappeared around the corner. If this was naptime, Stanley had earned it.
As I finished up my coffee, Stanley’s reflection bled into my own.
The world is rich. Anything can teach you about everything. You take a moment to focus on the details, and if you don’t look away, you see something special in it. And you don’t even need to leave your balcony for it to happen.
There was a world in Stanley. I just needed to stop and notice it.
I went back inside and got to work. I had just spent 15 minutes watching something, and that something was both small and bigger than I could describe.
It was just a dog…
But was it really?
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