Before time grew up

What can I say? All my life, I have found it much easier to understand animals and make agreements with them than with people. Sometimes you look at an animal and say, “Come on, let’s go!” And it goes. But sometimes you see the mailman and ask him, “So, did I get a letter from my family? Or maybe a package from my beloved China, where I have managed to order so many completely unnecessary things? I even ordered them before all those fools who were too slow to order all the unnecessary things that nobody needs?” And he never answers me. Not even once. He just looks at me angrily for some reason. All the time.

Sometimes I go to the shop to buy sausages for my friend. I don't really like sausages myself, but my friend absolutely loves them. Oh, how much he loves them! I always understand him without needing any extra words. So I go to buy sausages for my friend, and the nasty shop assistant gives them to me so carelessly that they always fall on the floor. Then my friend has to eat only dirty sausages. Once, a little ant even got stuck to one of them, but I did not remove it. Maybe the ant likes sausages too. And look how tiny he is! Let him eat too. I don't mind.

The important thing is that I manage to bring at least something home to my friend, because sausages are a very unreliable food. They can simply disappear right in front of your eyes. So you have to carry them to your friend very quickly and, preferably, with your eyes closed.

In general, the people in our village are normal. But it is much easier to find things to talk about with animals. Sometimes we can have very long conversations, sometimes even too long. Recently, we had a serious discussion about the geese. We were wondering why these geese are allowed to simply walk around and enjoy themselves while people are stuck in the fields from morning until evening. People work in the fields, dig the soil, poke around in it, and try to make something grow. And these geese? They just walk around in a line and judge everyone.

I don't understand their language, but I have a talent for understanding animals. So I immediately understand what they are saying. They are making fun of people. And when that happens, I take a stick and start chasing them. I used to chase them without a stick, but it turns out that a stick is much more effective. And a stick is useful in general. It is good for walking. It is good for digging.

But the most important thing is to do all this when nobody is watching, because people always start laughing. I don't understand why. What is so funny? It is a perfectly respectable stick. It has everything on it: an old sock on one end, the tail of a lizard on the other end — I tried to catch that lizard recently — and in the middle of the stick is my greatest pride: a piece of sausage skin that I worked very hard to wrap around it.

So I only take this stick when my neighbors are not looking, because they always laugh. And when I look them directly in the eyes, they look away. When I start walking toward them to ask what is wrong and what happened, they suddenly find some important work to do inside their houses. They always run inside, as if they suddenly remembered that there is a half-eaten piece of sausage on their table and that some guests are about to arrive.

But I am a cultured person. When I visit someone, I never ask for food. I can eat at home. I can eat outside. Why would I need to eat at someone else's house? And what if they come to visit me later and want to eat at my place? That would be embarrassing. So I teach everyone good manners by setting the correct example: you should eat before you go somewhere, especially before you come to my house.

Birds are interesting too. We sometimes have very good conversations. They also like collecting sticks and using them to do things, so we can spend a long time learning from each other.

So I cannot really complain about being bored. There is only one problem: I cannot make my friend happy. Not with a sausage, not even with a conversation. He just sits there all the time and looks straight ahead.

I think I really need to tell the mailman to write a letter to my friend. He carries so many letters every day anyway! He could write something simple:

“Everything is fine. Everyone is doing well. Everyone has everything they need. There are lots of sausages every day, the house is always warm, the carpets are thick and soft, and there are no fleas. Absolutely no fleas.”

Then my friend would definitely become happy. And then, just like before, many years ago, the three of us — and sometimes even four of us — could play with a stick again. Maybe we could even chase that mailman on his extremely fast bicycle.

We used to have such a happy life. The four of us. Before time became older. Before time became an adult. Before time found other things to do — things that were apparently more important than sitting in a village and chasing geese.

People are very stupid. They don't like being happy. They like running somewhere every morning where nobody likes them. They run to people who are not waiting for them, but at the end of the month those people give them little pieces of paper. And people run around with these pieces of paper. They constantly exchange them with each other. Sometimes they even exchange them for sausages.

And when you become completely exhausted from running to those people with the little pieces of paper, when you can no longer do a good job pretending that you enjoy following all the commands they give you, they stop waiting for you too. They stop inviting you there.

And then you look around...

And suddenly there is nobody left for whom you would want to run after those little pieces of paper.

That is why I am wiser than all those people.

I run after sausages.

And I wag my tail very beautifully.