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LAGNIAPPE - The 11th Commandment by Will Maguire
The 11th Commandment by Will Maguire
Ask any Tennessean which they love more, their guns or their dogs, and there will be a long pause.
You might be able to pry out an answer eventually, but the truth is in the South both are a kind of third rail. Touch either and you’ll end up regretting it.
Recently guns and dogs and love collided here in Percy Warner Park. A couple was walking their unleashed German Shepard when a man a few feet behind them drew his gun and shot the dog six times killing it.
Police were called. One account reported that the man’s brother was mauled as a child, and that he feared, perhaps unreasonably, for his safety.
People are forever shooting at their own pasts trying to kill an old wound.
It is legal to carry a firearm in Tennessee parks and illegal to have an unleashed dog. Everyone has a right to defend themselves but sometimes a right can go terribly wrong.
It is not a crime to shoot a dog.
But, as any Tennessean will tell you, it is a sin. Moses got it wrong. There should of have been 11 Commandments. Thou shalt never kill a dog.
So for me I would choose dogs over guns. Why?
A gun will never wait patiently for you by a door after a hard week or curl up at your feet you on a cold night. And a gun will never stare into your eyes like only it knows how much worry can fit into the end of a month.
I knew an old man once. His wife had died suddenly leaving him with only time and memory to accompany him. On advice from a friend he got a shelter dog someone had pushed out of a car when it was too old to keep.
The old man, injured by love and loss, had grown bitter. He tried to teach the old dog new tricks. He tried endlessly to teach it to play dead. When the dog refused, he would kick it.
The old dog forgave the man, who it turned out, was teaching himself to play dead. And in time it was the dog that taught the man what every thrown away shelter dog knows.
How to forgive. And how to live again.
Guns do not have puppies but even so there will always be more guns than dogs.
Guns properly maintained can last forever. And as anyone that has ever owned one knows even old dogs die too young.
Killing a dog may be a sin but I understand this week in Percy Warner park, the dog’s owner, an enlightened and grace filled soul tearfully embraced the shooter.
Forgiveness however is not a trick. It requires a certain kind of spirit. And it takes practice.
I bet he learned that from his dog.
*11th Commandment was published in the Tennessean after the tragic event happened in Percy Warren Park.
