08/23/2021
I have been placed in a rather interesting position. Things became difficult during the pandemic. Myself, my wife and daughter, had to face a great deal of hardship. We did our best to resolve matters, but poverty, acrimony and circumstance closed in around us.
Under normal circumstances, we are loving and considerate to one another. But the entire neighborhood was in an uproar and under great stress. Acrimony and desperation was abundant.
We stayed behind our fence and tried to avoid others. I had to be very creative to remain employed. I am not sure my activities fit the definition. My employers were Guinea pigs. Quite literally.
The parameters of our limitations were specific. My wife was born with disability. I loved and married her anyway. We had a daughter.
When she reached the age of 6, I got her a guinea pig. It quickly died. It had spent its entire life in one small cage, and could not endure handling.
We got another Guinea pig. Then another. Soon, they created more. My thought was that my daughter needed to understand something.
Life is beautiful and terrible at the same time.
The price any living being must always pay, is that of dying. It is hard for the compassionate to endure. Some choose to be callous and uncaring instead. Others will deny one and attempt to control the other. It rarely ends well, though it always does.
I wanted my daughter to feel unafraid of compassion. I wanted her to understand life. That it holds it's happiness and sadness as a whole.
She is the last of our family. Her parents are older and have only perhaps 20 years left. Her grandfather is struggling with cancer. She must face certain things at some point in her life. I did not want her to face them without knowing their import and meaning. I did not want her to face loss, without knowing means to acceptance. I did not want her to confront realities unprepared and feel alone.
Guinea pigs have their own ideas. They are a predated species of rodent, designed to compensate for eventualities. As pets, we are obliged to compensate for their profligacy, but they are very determined and we do not always succeed. Their number can grow to the point of inconvenience. We could not accept ending their lives prematurely. We appreciated and cared for them. Every mistake that was born into life, we loved and accepted. I was born as one myself. So was my daughter.
Accidents happen. If you live with them happily, you may find how it is that they are no accident at all. You may not know their purpose, to begin. But you can find one. It is in both faith and resourcefulness
But my wife had limitations. The time came when she could endure no more. She took our daughter and went back to her family in New Zealand. She was gone for a year.
I tried to work a job at 40 hours per week and also take care of them. I would be up at dawn to feed them, then forage for food after work until well after dark. But there came to be too many. Boys found their way among the girls. Their number grew to 700.
My wife could not find support among her family or employment in her country. She returned home and tried to make the best of it. I tried to improve prospects at my employment and took a higher position. But they wanted someone better and found reason to be rid of me.
I thought my wife and daughter needed to have me nearby. I chose to look for a way to make our life work. I began to look for a way to make Guinea pigs not only sustainable, but in a manner compatible with people. This means profitable, due to economic realities. They had to pay their way. But you cannot sell Guinea pigs profitably. Too few will spare the time to care for them. You should not make them into food. They are loving, feeling and thinking creatures that deserve their lives.
We faced a difficult situation. We would do anything but allow our animals to come to harm. A predated species is designed to compensate for harm. It will create as many progeny as is possible. This ensures their continued existence. It also guarantees their increase in numbers until a balance is reached where harm is encountered, if there are no other controls.
Hunger, disease, accident and predation are all controls. If we remove them, we must provide others. This is part of the human condition, so well as any. If you must be precise, as an apex predator we do not have predation. We have war. Among other things. We choose life anyway.
Over the years, they found opportunity to express this nature. Especially with people who are not perfect in controlling them. Cavius porcellus does not exist in the wild. Humans provide the only environment that they now live in. We were their environment in our accommodation.
We looked for a way to compensate for their nature. Most put them in a cage. This inhibits their ability to express it. Any cage presents loss of freedom. We are not the only beings who appreciate our freedom.
We sought alternatives. The complexity of their social order that manifested at the opportunity was unique and admirable. Most people are entirely unfamiliar with it. But we wanted to have fewer. We looked for options.
We found compromise. A rescue offered to take our girls. They did not want our boys. Boys will compete with one another and are more difficult to handle. They would take only our girls. But there was also a hidden price.
For the rescue to make a profit, they needed sympathy. Their business model was to solicit donations by portraying animals in distress. When they got back to Los Angeles with our girls, they created a campaign. Tales of a "hoarding situation", disease and neglect were published on the Internet. Fantastic costs were cited and funds were solicited. They made many thousands of dollars. We are one of many, depicted this way.
The effect among people who believed them was anger and hostility. It was directed toward us. We wanted to take care of our Guinea pigs, but it was made very difficult. More than verbal abuse was encountered. Tires were slashed. Hostility was endured. But we would not abandon our animals. We placed their value above that of social convention.
My wife believes in social convention. It was very difficult for her.
But we got their number down to 300 and there it remained.
People do not particularly understand Guinea pigs. There is difference between males and females. Males will scratch, bite and compete with one another. They need room and distance in order to express behavior that communicates their feelings to minimize the chances of being hurt. It is physical behavior. Scratching and biting can cause injuries and hair loss. It makes them less than attractive to people who feel they are damaged. While true, it is part of their nature. They heal quickly, and learn what avoids this.
This effects their social order and complex hierarchy. It is promoted as disease and neglect among those who prefer this interpretation. It encourages ignorance and creates blame.
For some, this amounts to profit. Their goal is to enable pet fanciers to keep perfect animals. This is commendable. The effect is to deny them their nature by control and imprisonment. This is less so, but it depends on your values. We tend to value things by what they are for us. We might value animals for what they are for themselves.
Some do not know what they have until they lose it. If you do, you may gain a greater appreciation.
I have recently been caged. It is a torment and waste of life. Any thinking creature would consider it punishment. But it is the first thing we think to do with animals. We treat people like animals, to lower them in this respect. We might treat animals like people, to raise them in another. If you are made a prisoner, you learn respect. But it is come by way of fear. The reality is we must compromise in order for everyone to get along. Some need be caged. Some do not.
The rescue sold our girls because they were in perfect condition. Just as they denigrated our boys to solicit money because they weren't. Their efforts are selective toward profit, not compassion. They are disingenuous in representing themselves otherwise. We respect capitalism. But not under the guise of altruism and charity.
We became subject to their representations. We became alarmed at the vitriol and created over 500 videos to try and show how happy and healthy our animals were. We did our best to show that there are very important consequences that must be handled and dealt with. We observed that acceptance was valuable, even as we tried harder to do our best. Our success came by degree, not absolutes.
We felt it important to point out that it was a great deal of responsibility and work. We would warn people against such things and recommend precautions from what we learned, but we would not abandon our charges. We took our duty of care for a moral imperative.
We also began to attract followers on our YouTube channel. They asked questions and we tried to show what we had learned. There are many similarities in motive and reason between humans and animals. It began to make money. The Guinea pigs came to pay for themselves.
We had discovered a business model that would let us stay behind our fence and away from people during pandemic. It seemed an important and responsible thing to do. It held the potential of letting us get through all this intact, as a family.
But it was hard work and difficult to take while people took shots at us. Many sought approbation and attention attacking us to gain approval among their friends of similar view. They were not above misrepresentation. They were often subject to it. We got attention and thought it would create understanding. But there were others who worked at creating their own.
Appearances are everything, to some. When it suits their needs, they are not interested in other views, only promoting their own.
The years wore on. Many Guinea pigs lived their lives happily and died naturally. There were accidents, each a sorrowful lesson we learned to prevent. Their very nature is to take small chances, avoid misfortune and sacrifice nothing. They lived long and well, but not forever. We mourned dear friends and embraced it all as the wholeness of their lives.
Just as things are for Guinea pigs, so it is with all of life. We are not apart from it. My wife began to suffer from colitis. The hospital surmised that she had carried this condition all her life, but it was beginning to get worse. She has many conditions. We do our best to overlook them and live a normal life. It may be that I am not sufficiently attentive to her needs. But she does not like to admit that they exist. She has fought against them all her life. I have helped in attempting to regard her as whole and complete, without limits. But she takes a great many medications. They vary widely in effect.
The hospital mistakenly gave her opioids which made her psychotic and paranoid. She came home after that, but remained untreated. She tried very hard to return to all the work that needed done at home. But she was very worried about her personal survival.
She did not know how long she could continue taking care of everything and try to keep going. The sweeping, cleaning, washing and dishes were a great deal of work for her. She lost much of her faith and did not feel any encouragement. She wanted to change things so they could be not only easier, but more possible.
We had agreed to a condition. That our animals would not come to harm. This came into conflict with our personal well being. We could not disregard that many sacrifices had been made along the way. We were poor. Maintenance to our home was in arrears. We were getting older. We began to worry about our future.
Arguments began. They poisoned the harmony of our home over months. I began to detach and spend most of my time outside. I let the animals keep me busy. My wife felt trapped. Our daughter spent most of the time in her room. She found a great deal more of interest on the Internet. She remained very busy online at school.
Eventually, my wife became very determined. Each time I would come into the house, an argument would begin. This went on for an entire day. Then another. I became exhausted at trying to oppose her outlook on matters and remain positive. I chose to join her, instead. We said dark things to one another. In the end, we were simply saying the worst things we could think of. It came down to our marriage.
I told her she was tormenting me. Twice.
We resolved our goals. We would move away quite so soon as we could find better. The neighborhood had become horrible. She was afraid to go outside the gate for fear of being accosted. I would patrol it in the evening hours as though a perimeter. The fighting and abuse among neighbors was a constant, day and night. The aging commercial refrigeration unit across the street created a racket, pointed directly toward our bedroom window. It was difficult to find any peace at all.
Of course, we would take the Guinea pigs. We could never leave them behind. But we both knew how impractical that was. We did not have the money to make things magically happen. It would be a long and difficult process.
Instead, we found a shorter way. We did not mean to. But it constituted the necessary sacrifice that none of us could make. It held a terrible price.
I thought it was over. We had found consensus. We would look for better. But she was not finished and said something. It held fear of the opinion others kept of us. It was not what she said, but how she said it. The hate and contempt made me reach out impulsively. She hid her smile behind a teacup. I tipped it.
I had meant to spill some on her as I was leaving the room, out of a simple spirit of reciprocal meanness. Instead, she fell back and hit her head on a chair. Our daughter came rushing downstairs and I ran out of the house. I struggled to realize what had happened.
I had hurt my wife. I came around to the front of the house, but it was too late. I could never apologize or speak to her again.
My daughter had been told of this eventuality. She had been instructed to call the police when it happened. I came to realize that she had been told many things while I was not there. That her mother had reason to fear me. True or not, I had ignored the signs.
She had come downstairs to warn me of this many weeks before, but I did not understand. I had no context or precedent. Her warnings were cryptic and incomplete.
I did not know that there was a plan B.
I spent weeks, imprisoned in isolation. This was pandemic. I had a great deal of time to think about it. I realized they had been making plans in this, that it was the only way she could find. Social services would rescue them from their predicament. They would get a new and clean home to live in. They would get sympathy, support and funding.
They only needed me as a batterer.
I was not worth much. I spent all my time taking care of Guinea pigs. I was exhausted. I did not spend enough time taking care of them. My wife had to do something. She had to survive and find a livable situation for her and our daughter. She needed someone to be there as her infirmity grew. Her fate is that she will only become more dependent. Her daughter was her best hope for a future.
The judicial system is only interested in right or wrong, yes or no, black or white. It finds little value in shades of grey. I must be guilty, to prove their innocence. My wife could not equivocate. I had to be wrong, for them to be right. There could be no misunderstanding. I must be an evil to be punished. They must be victims to receive assistance.
I understood things somewhat differently. I had only known love for my family. I had never known hate. I knew only that my wife had to do this for her personal well being.
There had been intimations. My participation in argument brought her to an emotional state that caused her not to care for me well enough to become capable of it. She came to the understanding that I did not care for her. Under such stress in the midst of argument, she is probably right. We had grown used to saying things from anger. I had grown used to anger subsiding, where we could feel differently. I thought we would always give one another a chance to do better. I hoped for a future where things could improve.
But once she pulled the trigger on domestic assault, there was no going back. If I was not guilty of it, she was guilty of false accusation. There are penalties for both. It is her or me.
Her greatest fear is that I do not understand. I understand perfectly. Just perhaps, differently. We always reach for greater understanding, until we have a story that we must stick to.
Then, we defend it. Embellish and justify the reasons we come to particular conclusions. We are trying to get somewhere with our stories. It is called a narrative. Often one we live by. My wife is simply trying to survive, by the only means she finds available. She must tell the story that allows this.
I think that there are alternatives. I believe that there still were. But we are not the same person. We have to make choices based on what we understand. I think that there was a moment that she was tired of being sick and I was sick of being tired. We turned on each other. Moments will pass. But their consequence remains.
I am willing to amend my stories with greater understanding. It lets me learn and grow. They are so true as I know them to be, but as I learn more, they become truer. This does not suit the needs of some who look for black or white. It is never so simple, until we decide it is. Once we do, we have belief. An opinion, but it ceases to learn and grow.
It is my preference to seek greater understanding. I will tell my story again and again. It too, will learn and grow. It is the same story, but changes as I do.
With the judicial system, you must stick to your story. They care only for right or wrong. They must choose what is fact, decide and move on. So must we all. But Justice is a fixed thing. People are not. As they move on, they gain perspective. The law makes them return to the place of their wrongs, to pay for them. Even when they have paid dearly to find what is right.
Have I found truth or not? I do not know. But I know that when I found truth with my wife, I was happy. When we agreed to share our truth, we could live together. It did not matter what others considered it to be. They might tell us we were living a lie. Even so, it was one we lived with together. It was enough for us to be happy.
We had a wonderful family that included Guinea pigs. Many people watch them and and were greatly endeared. They loved to see them live their lives. They were real. Their lives came with sadness and joy, pleasure and pain, all the things that ours do. We gave them all the freedom and every opportunity that was possible. We did our best to keep them safe from harm. Their lives were no easier than ours. We never tried to create more of them. But we always welcomed and cared for those so fortunate as to have their lives.
There are Buddhist principles that boil down to respect for and appreciation of life. It it does not amount to quantity or quality, but acceptance and encouragement. All living beings deserve the best that we can give them to make what they will. It is what makes us worthy of being one ourselves.
You may find rules or even laws that make this wrong. My life experience makes me feel this as mistaken. I can be punished into obedience. I will avoid what causes me harm. But I will not harm others. I have done that too, and know the difference. The lesson of harm to others is sorrow. Mine is complete. The only thing others can add is vengeance.
If I have a soul, so do animals.
Mine will go to the next life or on to nothing at all, in this appreciation.
My position? I am old and alone. But not so much. I still have love for my family. I do not know if they have love for me. We are not allowed to speak. It is up to them to change this. I wish they would.
I have looked back on my life. Now I look forward. I will take what I have learned. You may take from this what you will.
My story is not finished. Everything has changed. I can only guess at some things that have happened. I believe that my wife and daughter kept trying to live in our home, after they removed me. But they did not realize how much I was holding together.
They could not possibly have taken care of the Guinea pigs properly. It was a delicate affair. Many of them needed special attention daily. Many of them had lived long lives and needed special help to get along. I knew which needed special food for their teeth that were bothering them, which had wounds that needed treatment, who had become old and decrepit, needing a special place where they could be safe and warm. Their character and condition dictated what should be done for each of them. There was very little room for error. There was always room to do better.
All this ended, when I was removed. The suffering must have been terrible. When I got out on parole, I did not know what to do but go back there. It was my home of 34 years. For so long, I had done nothing but return faithfully. I watched animal control parked in front of our house from the proscribed distance. I emailed my wife in spite of the restraining order, begging her to understand.
She put me back in jail. I spent more weeks in isolation. Then, it became months. There was nothing to do but attempt understanding. I filled every piece of paper I could find with words, until the pencil was too short to write with. I read my words and saw a great deal of suffering and mental disturbance. I saw that my cognitive capacities had declined from stress and inactivity.
But they finally let me out into the general population, where I found some books on Buddhist principles. Instructions on meditation. I learned to calm much of my agitation. I began to see isolation and imprisonment as a lesson. One dearly needed, after spending 10 years trying to care for our animals night and day, to then have them torn away. I worried for them. But I worried more for my wife and daughter.
I was finally given a plea bargain. The court would be satisfied with an admission of guilt in exchange for my freedom. They asked me if I was sane and capable of making such a decision. I would have been insane, to return to prison.
But I was not the same. Nothing else was, either. I could not live in my home. It had been put into abatement. It was easy for my wife to convince authorities that she needed another. The heater broke down. The sewer backed up. They found structural problems unsurprisingly, with a house built in 1908 that had been there longer than me.
But the people who rescued my wife and daughter were just friends. What they believed did not matter. They were there to help.
I do not know what happened to our Guinea pigs. Except that the rescue took credit for it. All the boys however, mysteriously disappeared. I know where they went, but I don't wish to ask. I spent much of my life trying to protect them. Someone else was obliged to take the burden, but only to resolve matters definitively. Apparently, it did not go well. I am being arraigned for abuse of animals.
In actually being there with them over the years, I learned the language of their behavior. I could tell what happiness meant to them. It was not just in their eyes, but their entire bodies. As was every other feeling we might attribute solely to human emotion. I learned humility in the arrogance that we are less than one in same.
Some will overlook the view of animals, in what is wrong or right for them. They forego the designs of nature for their ideals. Their goal is merely finding someone to blame for shortcomings to personal and subjective ideas of propriety. They are obliged to this, for the satisfaction of others. Others who were never there, knowing only what they believe for what they are told. They believe animals should not be harmed.
Oddly enough, we are in agreement. But I did not see them offer to help, only to punish. It is enough for them to feel they are right. But even the righteous cause terrible wrongs in anger.
If you want to see videos of beautiful and happy animals that we loved and cared for to best ability, go to the YouTube channel with my wife's name on it. If you wish to be horrified by by their untimely end, examine the videos by animal control. I am sure they suffered terribly. You may blame who you will. But Guinea pigs never blamed anyone. They were only happy to have their lives.
