Walking Wisdom

by Gotham Chopra

  Take for example, I proposed to Papa, what was unfolding in North Korea. The whole dance between Washington and Pyongyang appeared so staged and choreographed, insincere, the cynic would suggest. In the coming hours as the news actually broke and the world started to see images of former president Clinton enduring ceremonies and rituals in North Korea meant to satisfy Kim Jong-il’s craving for acknowledgment and attention, a clear impression came across. These were formalities that masked the frosty relationship that preceded President Clinton’s visit and that would most certainly remain after he left. It felt like the exact opposite of the type of instinctive emotion we had just been discussing in regard to Cleo and her other canine brethren.

  “Well,” Papa countered, “there’s a lot of value to ritual, actually. The point of all rituals is to capture a certain state of consciousness. Weddings and funerals, bar mitzvahs, Indian thread ceremonies, and thousands of other religious rituals are meant to isolate specific moments and invoke a certain atmosphere and holiness. Ritual often sparks a process that can either trigger healing or formalize a new life stage. Ritual is in fact a powerful part of human civilization, even if it feels formal and insincere at times.”

  We humans, of course, can be the masters of insincerity and can take our rituals to the most lofty of heights. When it comes to the notion of forgiveness, we’ve created national debates that have lasted generations as to whether or not our president should formally apologize to the descendents of Native Americans whose predecessors were robbed of their land and worse. In places like South Africa, “truth and reconciliation commissions” have been set up to acknowledge and address the dark legacy of apartheid. In other words, forgiveness and reconciliation does not come easy to us, if only because the crimes that we can commit against one another can cut so deep and wound so gravely.

  “And yet still,” Papa said, “we can never stop aspiring to be greater, can we?”

  “Dada, look!” Krishu pulled on Papa’s sleeve. A white swan lolled into the water, slipping between the other less graceful ducks. On the contrary, no matter how many times Krishu had indulged in this ritual in his two years—watching the swans and ducks at the park—it always seemed to spark the same genuine euphoria in him.

  “Wow,” Papa exclaimed, now having gotten the hang of reciprocating Krishu’s enthusiasm after several weeks with him. “Should we go closer?”

  Krishu’s eyes widened with disbelief. He clutched his dada’s hand and hopped from the bench, pulling Papa toward the ducks as if to ensure that Papa would not change his mind.

  I sat back and watched the two of them. Cleo looked toward me, seeking guidance if we were staying or going. There were times that chasing ducks and swans and pigeons around parks could fill up entire days for her. These days, by six a.m. she was already looking for her first reprieve from activity. She settled back down beside my feet, happy to wait out Papa and Krishu’s playtime before heading off to Starbucks and back home.

  Then again, I thought to myself, looking down at her and then over to Papa and Krishu frolicking by the edge of the pond, wherever this ragtag group was, for me really was home.

  Chapter Nine

  So, Papa—what is the meaning of life?

  The meaning of life is the progressive expansion of happiness. It is to harmonize the elements and forces of our own being with the elements and forces of the cosmos so that we participate in its future evolution of creativity, insight, imagination, infinite possibilities, and also the qualities that we most long for: love, compassion, joy, kindness, equanimity.

  Most people have a deep yearning at some stage of their life to seek out the meaning, significance, and purpose of their existence, to understand the deepest mysteries of the universe. I like to think that even seeking the answers to those powerful questions, the process of that exploration, has its own deeper meaning. I know for me it has been that way.

  EARLY MORNING PHONE CALLS CAN SPELL BAD NEWS. NOT this one. “Great news,” Mom said over the crackling line. “Nana is doing much better. He’s asking about everyone.”

  Great news indeed. Nana’s inquisitiveness was back. I could think of no better indication of his recovery.

  “He asked me what you were working on,” my mother said. “So I told him.”

  “Yeah.” I kind of cringed. “So what did he think of that?”

  “He wondered what you could possibly write about that ‘half-mad’ dog.” She laughed. “His words, not mine.”

  “Half-mad” is a uniquely Indian expression. “Half-anything,” in fact. “Half-baked,” “half-cooked,” “half-thought.” It was a glorious term, because while “half” of something suggests a portion of the whole—that someone who’s half-mad would not, theoretically, be as crazy as someone who is “fully mad”—the “half-mad” person in Indian-speak is actually totally nuts, maybe even two times as crazy. Crack that nut if you can.

  Nana considered most of the Western hemisphere half-mad. When Mallika and I were younger and Nana and Nani used to travel and stay with us, Nana would shake his head at the way Americans dressed—teens in torn jeans, girls in short skirts, men with earrings (myself included)—and dismiss the whole lot as “half-mad.” America was a curious land, a mishmash of strange customs, traditions, rituals, and oddly outfitted citizens.

  And then there were our dogs. Nana’s experience with dogs was pretty much limited to Nicholas—not the best representative of his species. Nicholas’s anarchic temperament ran contrary to the qualities that Nana, a former member of the Indian airforce, held in high regard. If discipline, focus, and structure were things that Nana valued, then Nicholas, and subsequently Cleo, stood in defiant opposition in pretty much every way. Much like my father, Nana was convinced that he could train Nicholas to be a submissive and disciplined dog. Nicholas, of course, proved him wrong with all the sound and fury he could muster.

  When Nana caught a fleeting view of Cleo’s wild ways, he concluded it wasn’t even worth his time and effort to try to harness her. Seeing the way she barked and howled when anyone came home, running laps around the house, dashing in and out of every room (stopping, occasionally, to mark her territory), it was at this stage that he initially invoked the term “half-mad.” If the shoe fits . . .

  Nana valued the great heroic dogs heralded through history. On the silver screen, probably the most famous was Lassie. Who can forget when the loyal canine alerted the sheriff that little Timmy had fallen down the well? Or how about Laika, the Soviet husky mix that was the first animal to enter orbit when it went up in space aboard Sputnik 2? If ever there was a communist worth emulating, it was that interplanetary pooch. And what about presidential dogs, notably President Clinton’s Lab Buddy, who had to live up to his name during the president’s darkest hours. Man’s best friend indeed.

  And then there are those fantastical mutt myths that lead owners like me to believe that dogs like Cleo should have Jedi-like intuition. You know, the ones that sense things like earthquakes, fires, hurricanes, and tsunamis, skillfully warning their masters of the impending dangers? Fortunately for Cleo—in case she ever had any issues of self-esteem—she showed no desire to live up to these lofty standards. She’s content in her antihero status. Never once has she alerted us to a forest fire or earthquake. Her sense of people is equally unrefined. While she shows a remarkable capacity to recognize family, even those remote members we see only now and again, pretty much everyone else falls into a collective bucket marked stranger. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a friend, neighbor, delivery man, or cable guy, if you’re not family you’re a stranger—an interloper, really—and treated to Cleo’s particular brand of hostility. Ready. Aim. Bark.

  Candice and I have adjusted to this as we have to the rest of Cleo’s eccentricities. We’ve built a veritable sanctuary in the back of the house, outfitting our master bedroom with a plush dog bed, a range of toys, food, and water bowl. Cleo is remanded to this area whenever someone visits the house, our own little madwoman in the attic.
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  Even with all that, Candice and I knew a new challenge loomed when she became pregnant. As both of us worked considerable hours, we’d need someone to care for our little one, to look after her needs, bathe and clean up after her, and make sure she was also fed. Oh, and she would need to be good with the baby too.

  We had to find a nanny. This, of course, meant bringing a nonfamily member into the house, someone we not only trusted with our child, but who could also coexist with Cleo. I dubbed the mission “Operation Neo” after Keanu Reeves’s role in the film The Matrix.

  Still, it was Candice who was the leader of this mission, if for no other reason than leaving it to me would have led to inevitable disaster. I had tipped her off when I brought up the idea of the Swedish au pair, a strategy I had employed to relieve me of any responsibility. Candice, meanwhile, had more constructively employed a variety of meaningful strategies, from signing us up to nanny search services, to networking with friends and colleagues, to showcasing her protruding belly at the local park, where the powerful nanny cabal hung out daily. Early on, it appeared that this might in fact be the most effective technique. For the word was out and the nannies came a’knocking.

  It quickly became apparent to us that many of today’s prospective nannies do their own due diligence prior to interviewing. One woman, a fifty-ish immigrant with a narrow face and grandmotherly glasses, had apparently made the Chopra connection. As a result, she armed herself with a definitive strategy: Our child would be exposed only to vegan foods, no sugars, artificial sweeteners, and a litany of other selective ingredients. Television, video games, even certain types of music would be exorcised from the premises. Cleaning supplies that she concluded had toxic ingredients? Start the bonfire.

  Another prospective nanny, cheerful and plump, came dressed in traditional Indian garb (she was Honduran), removed her shoes, and greeted Candice and me with clasped hands and a “namaste.”

  Still another candidate canceled last minute on Candice because an audition at the same time of our scheduled meeting came through. I guess we should have known something was up when her résumé came with a stylized headshot. Josanna, a pleasant Brazilian woman, brought her ten-year-old niece as a translator, which might have been okay had the girl been able to speak English. And finally there was the woman who halfway through our otherwise not so alarming interview became distraught when she received a call on her mobile phone alerting her that her brother had been shot in Cuernavaca when a “business deal went bad.” Very bad.

  In this way, we ripped through almost a dozen interviews. Candice and I played along, firing off the questions Candice had scripted, and then nodding along interestedly even as we exchanged glances, raised eyebrows, or scowls. Cleo, meanwhile, had been remanded to her back room sanctuary, her muffled barks forming a steady, if not curious soundtrack to our fruitless process. We reasoned that unless a candidate was able to impress the two of us, what really was the point of subjecting them to Cleo’s wrath?

  “You have a dog?” one candidate inquired.

  “Yes.” I nodded wearily.

  “Her name is Cleo.” Candice filled the dead space.

  “She has very much energy.” The woman smiled awkwardly.

  I shrugged sheepishly, not sure what to say.

  “She’s very big?” This last question was accompanied by a nervous smile.

  Things were looking entirely wayward when Rosalita entered our house. Unlike many of the others, Rosalita had a confidence about her that was magnetic and encouraging. She was charming, complimenting Candice on her complexion and earning a smile from her that I hadn’t seen in precisely seven months. Rosalita was fluent in both English and Spanish (one of our secret hopes for our son) and answered all of Candice’s trick questions with precisely the right mix of thoughtfulness and spontaneity. To top it off, she carried a modest-sized binder that contained a number of very strong recommendations from former employers, agencies, and mentors.

  Rosalita had run our gauntlet with the same finesse a seasoned Hollywood starlet shows on the red carpet, saying all the right things with just enough variation that they didn’t feel scripted, smiling but not posing, and pausing once in a while to intimate serious contemplation on important issues, like at what point an infant should be forced to give up his pacifier. Still, despite all of this, Candice and I knew there was a final test she had to endure. We exchanged a nervous glance and I nodded, excusing myself to retrieve Cleo. I emerged from the back of the house with dog in tow, tightly grasping her leash as she lunged forward, barking up a racket directed at our guest. By this time, of course, the roles were reversed. Candice and I were the ones seeking to impress Rosalita and downplay our nutty dog so as not to ruin our chances with our Neo.

  “She’s really sweet,” Candice yelled over Cleo’s incessant barking. “She just needs to get to know you!”

  Even as Candice did her best spin, I could feel things slipping away. But Rosalita once again met this challenge head-on, demonstrating tremendous grace under fire. Bending down onto a knee, she reached into her purse and pulled something from it. Holding whatever it was in her clasped palm, she sought permission from us to offer Cleo a treat. Candice nodded with nervous attention and the two of us watched as Rosalita turned her palm and opened it with all the elegance of David Copperfield.

  A sucker for anything she might possibly ingest, Cleo quieted down. She knew the drill; it was often the only way to settle her down.

  “Come here, Cleo,” Rosalita beckoned in just the perfect tone and tenor. Nervously, I loosened my grip on Cleo’s leash, allowing her to move forward.

  “Don’t worry, Señor Chopra,” Rosalita assured me. “It’s okay.”

  I let Cleo’s leash go limp and she skipped across the room, coming to a graceful stop by Rosalita’s feet, sitting obediently there as if the woman were a long-lost aunt. Candice and I both stared speechlessly at what was playing out before us. Who was this imposter of a dog that had impersonated our dear Cleo?

  Even as we continued to gawk, Cleo took the treat from Rosalita, scarfed it down, and then licked the hand that fed her affectionately.

  We continued to talk, Rosalita sharing more about her own large family in Mexico. Her anecdotes of enormous weddings, festive holiday meals, litters of young kids running around relatives’ houses resembled uncannily what both Candice and I were familiar with in our own respective big fat Asian families. The conversation flowed easily, further cementing what Candice and I already knew—that we had found our Neo. Cleo sat calmly and submissively by Rosalita’s feet. As she smiled and laughed with us, Rosalita had one hand on Cleo, stroking her belly. By all appearances, Cleo too had found her Neo.

  I had become accustomed to wrapping up these interviews in no more than twelve minutes, but remarkably as I looked at my watch, I noticed almost a full hour had passed. Rosalita too looked surprised and rose to her feet, saying she was late for another appointment—changing the course of mighty rivers or scaling tall buildings in a single bound, no doubt. We exchanged good-byes, my promising to be in touch with her shortly so we might formalize things. She nodded bashfully, saying what an honor it would be to work for us.

  After shaking my hand, Rosalita turned to Candice, asking sweetly if it was okay to hug her instead of shaking her hand.

  “In my family,” she said with a smile, “it is good luck to touch a pregnant woman because they are the most precious beings on the Earth.”

  Candice beamed even more brightly than before and opened herself up for a big hug.

  That’s when the shit hit the fan.

  As Rosalita went in for her hug, Cleo absolutely lost it. As if she had been planning her war strategy in some silent Napoleonic fashion, Cleo didn’t just go at Rosalita directly, she leaped from the floor to the couch, vaulting herself off the leather surface and landing like a crazed animal with her paws and teeth embedded deeply into the woman’s blouse. Panicked, Rosalita swung from side to side but Cleo held on like a champ, snarling
and clawing with a ferocity I’d never seen in her.

  Rosalita tried frantically to dislodge Cleo as I did my best to wrestle Cleo from her. But the pup was undeterred and ripped through the woman’s silky blouse, shredding it, really, as if it were a highly classified document that needed to disappear. At long last when I was able to finally rip Cleo away, she once again squirmed out of my grasp and went back for more, snapping at Rosalita’s stockings, riddling them with tiny teeth marks.

  By now, Rosalita was absolutely terrorized, spinning in circles, swatting her arms as if she were being attacked by a swarm of bees, all the while screaming a string of obscenities. She staggered toward the door as I finally wrangled Cleo once more and held her pulsing frame tightly against my chest. Without looking back, Rosalita fled out the door and scrambled down the street, no doubt signaling to the neighbors that our house was the one with the poltergeist in it.

  We were devastated. Candice and I both collapsed onto the couch. Cleo, meanwhile, having just recovered her poise, snuggled up to Candice as if nothing at all had happened.

  “What the hell are we going to do?” I asked what we were both thinking.

  Candice stared at me blankly and sobbed, a reaction I had become accustomed to over the last few months but still didn’t have the first clue on how to manage.

  “Don’t worry.” I changed course as abruptly as possible. “We’ll figure it out.”

  I eyed Cleo wearily. Figuring it out might mean figuring her out.

  It was time to confront reality. Cleo was Cleo: She had never shown an aptitude for befriending strangers, and as she got older, things would only get worse. Gradually we started to think the unthinkable—sending Cleo back to live with Candice’s mother. It would only be temporary, we rationalized. Just until the baby arrived. Just until we’d found a nanny and things settled down. We’d figure out how to reintegrate her back into the house. Everything would be fine.