The following parable was originally published in E.MAG-The Electronic Magazine in 1995 and is reprinted here by permission of the author.
THE OLD MAN AND THE DOG – A MODERN PARABLE
There was once an old man that lived alone in a ramshackle house. His yard was over grown with weeds and the house was in desperate need of a fresh coat of paint. Inside he would sit everyday and watch the news on TV and curse society for all of its problems. At the end of the day he would lie alone in his bed and grumble in his old man way about how much he hated the world.
One day he woke up and went outside for his morning paper and sitting on his front porch was a puppy. The old man grumbled and looked around but no one was there except for him and the dog. Reluctantly he took the dog in and fed him, and in a corner set him a basket with a warm blanket. He called the dog Grizzly because it was unbearable to look at him.
Grizzly was a happy dog that wanted to play with the old man all the time but the old man would not do any more for Grizzly than he had to do. Every morning, Grizzly would sit at the foot of the old man’s bed and wait for him to get up so he could greet him. Every morning the old man would get up and make a point of kicking Grizzly across the room. The first time it happened Grizzly was so confused and hurt that this man that fed him and took care of him would hurt him in so cruel a way that he ran into the corner and did not come out until lunch. When he did, he was so penitent he sulked over to the old man and put his head in his lap and cried. The old man turned for a moment from the television and petted the dog once and then returned his attention to the show.
This ritual went on every day for years and over time Grizzly began to accept and expect the kick in the ribs. In fact, it had become so much a part of their morning ritual that the dog would barely even flinch.
One day Grizzly was lying in his ramshackle basket with his thread-bare blanket and dreaming of running in a field with a little child and just having a wonderful time playing and laughing. He could smell the fresh lilacs in the air and feel the dew on his paws. He was also a few years younger but much more energetic than now. It felt so good to be loved.
Whack.
Grizzly was jolted back to reality by the sharp kick to the ribs. He jumped out of his basket and looked up at the old man. There was a rage in his eyes that the old man had never seen before and when the hair went up on his back and he bared his snarling teeth, the old man grew afraid. Grizzly leapt at the old mans leg and sunk his teeth into the thin flesh. He bit and shook and bit and shook until the old man was down on the ground, bloody and crawling away. Grizzly went back to his basket and laid down on his threadbare blanket. He could hear the old man crying in pain from the front room. Grizzly closed his eyes and fell asleep.
When the police came to the house and found the old man bleeding and crying, they looked over and saw Grizzly. He sat up in his basket, his mouth covered in blood. Grizzly never felt the bullet from the policeman’s .38 caliber revolver strike him square in the head.
The old man turned to the policeman and said “I just don’t understand why he would do something like this. He was always such a quiet dog.”
Through the Mill 