Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Fanfare for the common dog

My dog belongs to the same pack as Dmitri Shostakovich and Aaron Copland. Both composers have inspired in Sunny the sing along urge. It is so cute, -- I did not say euphonious, I said cute. Last night on the telly we watched a special on wolves, and the sound of howling puzzled and riveted him. But only at the sound of the masters did he add his voice to the pack.

The sound of my dog gurgling to classical symphonies presents the spectre of gaps, gaps of which if we are unaware, we risk a punitive ignorance. The gap I mean is the gap between what you consider the known world and what the world actually is. The mystic participates in point blank reality, on occasion. The distance between ordinary humanity and someone like someone like Jan Cox is at least the distance between a canine and a classical composer.

This is not elitism. The world is as it is. I did not invent this planet. I am merely trying to point with fluffy words to a certain spotless reality. As inhabitants of this planet it behooves us to struggle to know what is. If for no other reason than to avoid getting our heads knocked through ignorance of the surrounding structure.

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