These are cold and trying times. Freezing rain is falling outside. The world is at war. The university needs to stand up and take action. Here’s what they’ve got to do:
Domesticated animals.
That’s right. A campus-wide infusion of dogs, cats, rabbits, hamsters and the occasional sheep. Remember when you went home for Thanksgiving? Remember when you walked in the door? Who was it who peed on the floor they were so excited you were home? Who was it who jumped up and down for several hours? Not your mom. Not your dad. Not even your brothers or sisters.
We’ve got twenty or thirty dogs at my house who devote the entirety of their attention to greeting whoever enters through the front door. The first time you come home after a long while, it’s an uncontrollable bruhaha, an instant party. Subsequent returns yield equivalent, if more subdued, ecstasy at the sheer fact of your return. It’s as if the cast of Cheers had been given canine form, and you’re Norm.
So, dogs in the quadrangle, dogs in Mallinckrodt, dogs in Holmes Lounge (only elegant, fireside dogs), dogs frumping to and fro through the tunnel system. You walk into Eads to use the computer lab-ten dogs coming at you. You’re hanging out in the library doing some research-fifteen Chihuahuas by your side.
Cats are essential to this equation, too, though. You can’t have a productive class with Dachshunds running around the desks like savage beasts. You can’t navigate the African Diaspora or discuss synesthesia in Nabokov with happy animals devouring your texts. So, cats in classrooms and dogs on campus is the way it must be. Cats are intellectuals by nature, anyway, plus they’re statistically proven to lower blood pressure. So one cat per every two or three students per classroom should be sufficient. These cats can contribute to classroom environs by yawning, stretching or falling asleep at appropriate moments. Purring cats will signal exceptionally well-done classes.
Of course, some will vie for the inclusion of other furry friends, such as rabbits, hamsters, Guinea pigs and gerbils. Unfortunately, rodents or rodent-like creatures don’t a mixture make with ever-predatorial felines. And so, certain classrooms, at the discretion of faculty and staff, will be equipped with these creatures. Most of these animals will of course be housed in translucent, plastic balls so that they might roll as they please across the classroom floor without scurrying up this or that leg.
I suggest sheep, as well. These placid animals can be put to pasture in all grassy areas on campus, keeping each and every plain and knoll trim and tidy and preventing the need for noisy, obnoxious lawn mowers. Top Care will still have a job to do, however. Importation of cat litter and cedar chips alone will occupy much of their time. And the provision of a poop-scooping service is a must. We might also seek to employ Babe: Pig in the City as shepherd-in-residence.
Some petless people will say, “Bah!” But I say, “Baa-aaa.” Everybody likes dogs, and dogs like everybody, unless you’ve got some bad mojo working. Some folks are allergic to dogs or cats, and that’s something that will have to come under consideration. It’s looking like expulsion is the most cost-effective method of taking care of this dilemma. Students will be given a choice of course. Some will want to endure chronic fits of sneezes and hives over seventy percent of their person in exchange for the tremendous morale boost that a domesticated animal presence on campus will bring. As we like to say here at Cadenza, it’s woof it.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 16th, 2001 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Cadenza. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.