I’ve had conversations with a Jack Russel Terrier recently. The bitch long decided that there was a rabbit down a certain hole and keeps digging and digging. Every time she digs down deep enough, the hole starts to collapse and someone has to pull her out. You can chastise her for digging, you can smack her across the nose with a rolled up newspaper, you can try and keep her occupied with other things to do, but the bitch just keeps digging. Her digging is pissing off the rest of the pack, partially because she keeps making a mess everywhere, and partially because it means that the pack cannot go off to play and hunt. Instead they all have to stop what they are doing and sit around watching her dig, watching for her to get stuck, so we can all pull her out.

The Jack Russel knows that she shouldn’t be digging, she knows that she is going to dig herself too deep, the tunnel will collapse. If there even is a rabbit that she has the scent of, it will just burrow away. “Rabbits are funny things”, I keep telling her, “the more you chase them, the more they run. If you want to a catch a rabbit, just sit and wait for them to come to you.” But does the bitch listen? Hell no. The bitch says ‘ya ya ya I know’ and agrees with you all the way, then soon as you go into the woods to shit there she is digging away and yapping “I think I’ve got it! I think I’ve got it!” Then the tunnel collapse, then the rest of the pack comes running up and drags her out, and asks her why she has done it again.

“I can’t help it!” She cries, “I am a terrier. I can’t stop myself.”

“Do you know how I stopped myself from eating slippers?”

“You said you just stopped putting them in your mouth….”

“Exactly! Its not complicated like trying to open a door or catch a cat. If you want to stop doing something, don’t do it anymore.”

“But it is who I am, I am a terrier, how can I stop chasing rabbits?”

“No one is telling you not to be a terrier, just stop digging the fucking hole. Chase a rabbit if you like –who doesn’t like to chase them– just stop once they jump down that hole.”

“But if I was truly part of the pack, you’d accept that as a terrier I have to chase rabbits down the hole.”

“If you weren’t part of the pack, you’d know it because my teeth would be in your jugular. You can’t sorta be part of the pack, and you can’t chose the pack you are part of, and you don’t get to define membership of the pack. The pack choses you. The pack makes the rules. The pack gets upset when the rules are broken. These rules are for the pack, but they are also for you. We may lose a bit of hunting time when you dig your holes, but it is you that keeps ending up in that hole. I am not saying that every pack member is always looking out for you, but I am saying that collectively the pack looks out for itself. Our interest is your interest.”

“But its who I am. I dig holes.”

“No, who you are is a bitch, like any other bitch, and like any other bitch you like to chase rabbits (who doesn’t!). Like any other bitch you can’t always stop yourself and get yourself stuck down a hole. Like any pack we’ll pull you out of that hole on occasions, but sometimes we’ll let you sit there for a while a whimper because it is irritating to have to keep pulling you out. Hopefully you’ll learn to stop digging the holes before one collapses and you can’t get out. Digging holes isn’t a state and it isn’t who you are, its a thing you do. Don’t think that people hate you because you dig holes. Is the fucking holes and you digging them that they hate. Its not about acceptance, its about not digging holes. You are not the holes you dig.”

“Its not that easy. If you had lived my life, if you knew what it is like to be me. ….”

“The problem with digging holes all the time is that you find yourself alone and in the darkness all so often that you think you are the only one, that no one has ever suffered like you have suffered, that no one feels like you feel. Spend more time out on the hunt with us in the sunlight and you’ll see that we all suffer, we all inflict suffering on our prey, and no one has the easy life you imagine they have. Life is often shit, and nature a savage imbalance of competing forces. Don’t imagine it otherwise. Take the good bits and relish in them, whince when bad shit happens then shrug it off for the good. Life isn’t that easy, but it isn’t that hard either. If everyone else can do it, you can to, you just need to find your own way. A wise painter once told me ‘Things are only hard in the beginning’. This is true. At first you’ll want to dig that hole, but don’t. Distract yourself, get something to eat, meditate, if your thoughts wonder to the hole, don’t fight it, endulge it for a while then think of something else. When you find your paws are getting dirty, just stop and get back into your basket.”

“I will try, I will try.”

“No, you will. You will stop digging the hole. Now I am going to try and catch some fish today, wanna come?”C