My dog is a racist bitch

It pains me to admit this, but my lesbian dog is a racist bitch. I knew for a long time that she did not like Jews and this was especially problematic since we are a Jewish family and her hatred is something she does not seem to have any problem hiding.

During Hanukkah prayers this year she would howl as if someone had hit her paw with a hammer. She would position herself under the table right around sundown, waiting for the traditional candle lighting. We would gather, begin to light the candles and recite the prayers and all of a sudden a low muffled moan would begin from below the table and soon enough, louder and louder until the howling would drown out the words if our prayers. The first night we were shocked and worried, we all thought she was in pain and the howling was so intense we knew she must be in some sort of interior unknowable trauma. Then, once the candles had burned out, she was quiet.

The same thing happened the second night and the third and we began to catch on. It was not pain, it was the Jewish ceremony she was protesting. By the fifth night I put her outside before we began the prayers and that’s when the howling became incessant barking. That night I figured she was just trying to disrupt our peaceful Hanukkah celebration, but then there was the knock on the door.

In our little diverse ghetto there are only a few people who knock on my door. One, the police in search of a criminal or warning on the latest gun toting crack head. The other door knockers are usually gun toting crackheads. That’s about it. That night it was an angry black man who wanted to talk to me about my “god damned racist bitch of a dog.”

Well, anyone who knows me knows that there is nothing I like to talk about more than my racist bitch of a dog (lesbian though she is) and here was my chance. We stood there in the doorway and he introduced himself. Apparently he had been working at a nearby home, doing some repairs and most evenings as he was locking up, my dog would run to the fence and bark like an insane, vicious, angry and bitter lesbian racist bitch.

Sounded just like my dog, although I was not sure how he knew she was racist, even though I was pretty damn sure she was. I asked him why he thought she was racist and he told me this story. A week ago a white heating repairman had been working on the same building and had left right before him and my racist dog did not react in any way, she just watched him through the fence and remained at peace. The black guy locked up the house he was working on, made his way to his truck and my dog lost her shit. Case closed.

“What would you like me to do? I asked the fairly intimidating black man at my door.

“Well,” he said, in an non-menacing sort of way, “she had to learn about racism somewhere.”

“Oh, that I know, trust me, that I know.” I said, almost too happy. “I know, I mean, she is a total racist. Hell, she hates Jews too, god knows what other hatred she has hidden in that big empty head of hers.”

“So you admit your dog is racist?” He asked me, kind of bewildered.

“You bet she is,” I said, proudly.

“And you don’t think this might be something she learned at home?” He said, sort of intimating that we might be some sort of crazy, racist family teaching our dog the tricks of the trade.

“Here?” I asked, incredulously.

“She had to learn it somewhere,” he said, as if she had learned to be an out and proud racist by wearing my white sheets and attending some sort of rally out in the country.

“Don’t be silly. She came that way. You think we taught her to hate Jews too? The only reason she has been outside in the evenings is because she has been interrupting our Hanukkah prayers every night for a week.”

“Wait a minute, you guys are Jewish and you have a Jew hating dog?”

“Yeah, well, we don’t like that part of her at all. In fact, would you like to adopt her?” I asked, in all serious as he began to turn.

“Yeah, like I want a racist dog hanging around my jobsite all day,” he said that as he left the porch and walked away. I called out to him and said something about how low maintenance she is, being a good sleeper and only waking to ruin holy prayers and bark at black people. He did not seem to respond, walking back to his truck and leaving in a huff.

By then my dog was back on the couch, sleeping and dreaming, I am sure, of lush fields in the country, where she and her other hate filled friends could run all day, sharing their mutual distrust of the Jews and the blacks. It’s funny that of all the dogs in all the world, I would end up with one filled with so much hope, with so much promise (she was on the Krakow Olympic Team) and now I have this overweight hater. She and I are both getting older and I wonder sometimes if I am not supposed to be learning a lesson from her hate.