By Chris Lee
Hello readers! This post should appear familiar—and if does not, then you definitely need to catch up on the work Cameron Beasley and Wes Cruse are doing. That said, my post will differ slightly. While Cameron and Wes are focusing on our wonderful English majors and minors, I will focus on the people who directly guide us through the discipline: our faculty members.
Dr. Hiro will be in the spotlight for this particular post, and while every reader would—logically—expect me to have asked her literary-related questions, I went in a completely different direction. Why? Although we rely on our professors’ expertise and are always interested in their thoughts regarding literature and writing, have we ever stopped to ask ourselves, “Exactly who is my professor?” Thus, my goal is for us to see our English professors as not just educators but as the regular humans they are—people with stories to share. And, for this post’s case, the story Dr. Hiro will share focuses on the lives that make ours a little easier: pets!
Question 1: One type of story that intrigues me is pet stories–or the lack thereof. So, do you have a pet? If so, what is their story or perhaps a specific adventure you have had with them?
I do not have a pet! I grew up with tons of cats and a few dogs, but in my adult life and with my husband and family, I’ve never had pets.
Question 2: If you do not have a pet, that in of itself is a story in my view. Why don’t you have a pet? Do you want a pet but are simply unable to care for one?
My two school-aged daughters (now 14 and 11) have asked for pets many times over the years. From the beginning I was sure I didn’t want a pet in a cage—so while their friends had gerbils or guinea pigs or lizards or turtles or fish, and thus they’d come home asking for animals like these, I just had to say no. It makes me too sad to think of housing an animal who lives its life in a 2×2 box. For the last several years, we’ve been talking about getting a dog (I grew up with cats but was always allergic—this was in the day of “outside cats” but obviously we can’t do that anymore…). Three of four of us want one (my husband and fellow English prof. Dr. Larson is not a huge animal person). But, I’m cautious because our lives are already full, and we’ve had these amazing opportunities to travel for long periods the last several years (two summers in Europe and a half-year in India) that would have been much harder if we had a dog to worry about. That said, I’m now regularly monitoring sites like “Street Dog Hero” and the Humane Society to see if the perfect rescue dog pops up to make us finally take the plunge…
(Photo courtesy of Dr. Hiro)