Pandemic Puppy: Polydisciplinamory in (Post?) Pandemic Times

Abstract

This performative piece considers human–animal relations in pandemic and post(?) pandemic times, in particular the exponential increase in pet adoptions during the COVID-19 lockdowns and the subsequent spectacular rise in pet relinquishments and abandonments following the easing of lockdowns and restrictions. We consider Jack Halberstam’s argument around the “zombie humanism” of pet ownership in relation to Donna Haraway’s ideas on human–animal kinship and Natalie Loveless’s notion of “polydisciplinamory” as an eros-powered alternative to the constraints of discipline-focused approaches to creative research/research creation. We bring these lines of thoughts together to propose a position of “poly-puppy-amory” as an antidote to the binary and heteronormative approaches both human–animal relations and the work of artistic qualitative research.

DAN:

We are living—or trying to—in post-pandemic times. No more masks on crowded trains or airplanes, no news of COVID case numbers or deaths, unless you go looking for them.

STACY:

But we are all also living—or trying to—in a pandemic-induced haze in which the adrenaline high we were on for 2+ years gives way to exhaustion and burnout.

DAN:

In a reality in which it’s time to get on with it and return the office, resume busy social schedules and long-haul travel, all while feeling reinvigorated and energised.

STACY:

In a new decade of which we’ve missed nearly an entire year. Two hundred and sixty-two days to be exact. Though no one is counting anymore—except maybe for us.

DAN:

During that 262 days we were subject to ever-increasing cures and drastic measures. Where what were once, early on, “snap” lockdowns of 5 or 10 or 14 days became long-haul lockdowns of 43 days. 77 days. One hundred eleven days (Boaz, 2021).

STACY:

During which you could only leave home to go to the pharmacy or grocery store, seek medical care, or exercise, but no more than 60 minutes per day and no more than 5ks from home.

DAN:

During which you could see no one except the people in your immediate family. No one.

HAZEL (Fig. 1):

Um. Hello? Excuse me?

Figure 1.

Hazel Harris.

TINKER (Fig. 2):

Yes. What is it, Hazel?

Figure 2.

Tinkerbell Jones.

HAZEL (Fig. 3):

Is lockdown over? It seems a little busier out there lately.

Figure 3.

Tinker and Hazel Talk it Over.

TINKER:

Yeah. It’s been over for years. I think. It’s a little hazy.

HAZEL:

Then why are they home all the time still? I mean, it’s a little co-dependent. I thought we were supposed to be able to be out more now. It’s boring in here.

TINKER:

I just think nobody wants to go out that much anymore, including Stacy and Dan.

HAZEL:

Well, COVID wasn’t all bad. They got both of us.

TINKER:

Totally. Once they started working from home and cancelled all of that ridiculous work travel, they thought they needed a little Hazel in their lives. Someone to play with Murphy.

MURPHY (Fig. 4):

[Glares.].

Figure 4.

Murphy Danger.

HAZEL (Fig. 5):

And they found me in Dubbo of all places, and Dan drove 8 hours to pick me up.

Figure 5.

Hazel.

HAZEL [Cont.]:

And then made me ride in the back alllll the way home to Melbourne. [Shivers.] I still hate riding in the car after that trip.

TINKER (Fig. 6):

What about ME!

Figure 6.

Tinker.

TINKER [Cont.]:

I had to ride in a truck with a bunch of other dogs, all the way from Sydney.

HAZEL (Fig. 7):

I told them I was fine, being an only puppy in a house with crabby senior dogs. I WAS fine!

Figure 7.

Tinker and Hazel talk it Over Some More.

TINKER:

Possibly. But you all love me now.

HAZEL.

True, mostly. Except for Murphy.

MURPHY (Fig. 8):

[Glares.]

Figure 8.

Except for Murphy.

TINKER:

Jesus, he’s scary. But i still want him to love me.

HAZEL:

Tinker. I’ve told you. You can’t make him love you if he won’t . . .

TINKER (Fig. 9):

[Singing] I can’t make his heart feel, something it won’t . . . .

Figure 9.

I want Murphy to Love Me.

HAZEL (Fig. 10):

You are no Bonnie Raitt.

Figure 10.

Hazel is Not Impressed.

TINKER (Fig. 11):

Thanks a lot. Let’s just say—except for Murphy—we were a CURE.

Figure 11.

Tinker and Hazel Are a Cure.

HAZEL:

Were we?

TINKER:

Sure! For loneliness. For purpose. For hope–that we’d get out of that godforsaken lockdown!

HAZEL:

And until we did, we had each other.

TINKER:

Right. You remember all of those studies they read that said we boosted Dan and Stacy’s wellbeing? Staved off loneliness? Gave them some distanced visiting with the neighbours at the dog park (World Economic Forum, 2021).

HAZEL:

The benefits of pandemic puppies flowed both ways—we felt loved with all the attention they gave us.

TINKER:

Well, we’re social animals. And there’s lots of evidence that human–dog relationships improve mental AND physical health (Morgan et al., 2020).

HAZEL:

No duh.

TINKER:

You’re forgetting the downside, Hazel.

HAZEL:

What downside? There’s no downside to us!

TINKER:

I think you know.

HAZEL:

I do not.

TINKER:

Hazel. You’ve never been fully socialised. You’re a bit of a freak in public.

HAZEL:

Look who’s talking! Who’s the one hiding under Dan’s coat at the dog park when someone just comes up and says hi? Not me!

TINKER:

[Pause]. Who jumped out of the car window?

HAZEL

[Cagey]. I thought I saw something.

TINKER:

Like what?

HAZEL:

Dunno. A bird who needed help. Or maybe a cat. It all happened so quickly.

TINKER:

You were freaked out to be in the car again, and because you never got to go anywhere, or travel at that kind of speed, you panicked.

HAZEL:

So, what if I DID panic? It isn’t my fault. I tried to learn the ropes as a puppy. How to act around other dogs. But how was I supposed to learn that on Zoom? I mean COME ON!

TINKER:

Well, I did.

HAZEL: [Mimicking].

“Well, I did.”

TINKER:

Let’s not talk about Zoom.

HAZEL:

I will! I will talk about Zoom. That is the real pandemic. Sure, it meant we could stay home and not get COVID, but it seriously messed with our hearts.

TINKER:

And heads.

HAZEL:

And relationships. Smells. Fresh air.

TINKER:

Any ability to have a coherent thought or conversation.

HAZEL:

We did have some fun though. On Zoom I mean.

TINKER:

Like when?

HAZEL (Fig. 12):

Like when you wore that hoodie and then ran along the back of the couch behind Stacy every time you wanted her to get off and take you outside?

Figure 12.

Hoodie Tinker.

TINKER.

Ah yeah. Good times. I got a few laughs doing that. And she actually did get off Zoom.

HAZEL.

Not very professional.

TINKER:

But it worked.

HAZEL:

You looked goofy in that hoodie. So embarrassing.

TINKER:

And you? In that cable knit sweater? Insisting Dan rock you in their arms during whole ENTIRE meetings?

HAZEL (Fig. 13):

That sweater was hot!

Figure 13.

Hazel Sweat(er).

TINKER:

Um. No, it wasn’t—

HAZEL:

Not hot, it was HOT! I panted full time when I had to wear that.

TINKER (Fig. 14):

And Murphy, doing that weird chicken noise every time he wanted to sit on the chair with Dan or Stacy. Always horning in so that he could get some screen time.

Figure 14.

Murphy Wants Some Screen Time.

HAZEL (Fig. 15):

He just wanted to say hi to Chris Poulos’ dogs.

Figure 15.

Chris Poulos, Finley and Lucky.

HAZEL [Cont.]:

But they were always passed out on the bed behind him.

TINKER:

That’s right! Why were they so good?

HAZEL:

Maybe Chris trained them or something?

TINKER:

[Thinking]. Could be . . . or maybe he drugged them?

HAZEL:

Probably. Doesn’t seem like Chris . . . but you never know!

TINKER (Fig. 16):

Anyway, Zoom was the worst of it for us. At least we weren’t part of the big wave of “pet regret” once lockdowns were lifted and they went back to work.

Figure 16.

Was Zoom the Worst of it?.

HAZEL.

I heard at the dog park that dogs being abandoned QUADRUPLED! (Evans, 2022). And not just older dogs. Puppies. Littles like us! (Seyfort, 2022).

TINKER:

Or worse. People changing their minds and advertising us for sale for thousands and thousands of dollars. Trying to make back the money the paid for us in the first place (Nagesh, 2021).

HAZEL:

That’s cruel AND dishonest.

TINKER:

I mean, if 23 million households—nearly 1 in 5—in the US adopted a pet during the pandemic (Bogage, 2022), then you got to think: What if Dan and Stacy change their minds?

HAZEL:

They wouldn’t. They love us. Just like when Dan got adopted, same thing!

TINKER:

Yeah, but they can’t give human kids back, it’s different with dogs. I read somewhere—

HAZEL:

Hang on. You can READ?

TINKER:

All that hanging out on the couch cushions behind the laptop wasn’t for nothing. I taught myself to read. To stave off the boredom.

HAZEL (Fig. 17):

Oh. Wow. Does Murphy know?

Figure 17.

Of Course, Murphy Knows.

MURPHY

[Murphy gives a knowing look. Same as his glare.]

TINKER (Fig. 18):

Murphy? He was the one who told me to do it!

Figure 18.

Murphy Told Me to do it.

HAZEL (Fig. 19):

He did? Why didn’t he tell ME? I mean, I could learn to read if I wanted to.

Figure 19.

I Could Read if I Wanted to.

TINKER:

Hazel. C’mon. You’re cute. And so, so lovable. But you are not a Rhoades scholar.

HAZEL:

I resent that!

TINKER:

I was trying to tell you something—

HAZEL:

[Flat]. Go on.

TINKER:

Do you know, Hazel, that a TRILLION puppies were thrown away or DIED after the great COVID puppy adoption?

HAZEL:

Really? Tinker. A TRILLION? That’s fake news. Stop watching Fox.

TINKER:

I watch for research. But all right. More like 15% got sick and died (Nagesh, 2021). But still. That’s a lot.

HAZEL:

[Blinking, silent]. Oh. That’s terrible.

TINKER:

It makes you almost think that Jack Halberstam is right.

HAZEL:

Jack who?

TINKER:

Queer theorist at Columbia. Author of Wild Things (2020).

HAZEL:

Oh, I like the sound of that. What’s it about?

TINKER:

How wildness has been associated with queerness. Historically.

HAZEL:

Queerness?

TINKER:

And how having pet puppies like us is like, petophilia.

HAZEL:

I thought that was something else. Not dogs.

TINKER:

PET-ophilia. A fetishization and commodification of the relationship between pets and humans (pp. 116–119).

HAZEL:

I thought we were companion species.

TINKER:

That was Donna Haraway (2003, 2007).

HAZEL:

So what’s wrong with that? I like being kin (Harris & Holman Jones, 2019).

TINKER:

No. Halberstam says pet commodification and fetishization is almost the same as heteronormativity (p. 156). A kind of pet-o-philia.

HAZEL:

Do you think that Dan and Stacy have a pet fetish? That’s creepy.

TINKER:

I think it’s good for us to be informed.

HAZEL:

It seems kind of us-them if I’m honest.

TINKER:

It’s a bit straight, isn’t it? A bit hetero. Ironically.

HAZEL:

I don’t even know what you are saying right now.

TINKER:

I’m just sick of binaries: pets/owners, gay/straight, dead/undead—

HAZEL:

As in zombies? Is that like the Zoomies? When we get crazy in the afternoon?

TINKER:

That’s more like Zoom. Pretending you’re living life when you are really going through the motions like the living dead.

HAZEL:

That’s dark, Tinker.

TINKER:

It is. Sorry.

HAZEL (Fig. 20):

How can we cheer you up? Hey Murphy, Tinker’s feeling dark again!

Figure 20.

MURPHY Is Not Concerned.

HAZEL:

How about what that nice person Natalie said when she was visiting us?

TINKER:

Natalie Loveless?

HAZEL:

Yeah her. Good pats from her.

TINKER:

Remember she talked about eros? About being more poly as a cure for what ails us? Polydisciplinamorous (Loveless, 2019, pp. 63–65). [Pause. Smug.] I love that.

HAZEL:

Wasn’t it just love? She said practice love. Be kin. ¹

TINKER:

No, she said to produce “new kinship ties, not only in terms of content (the ‘who’), but in terms of the form (the ‘how’)” of our work (2019, p. 63). It is about following desire as an act of curiosity (p. 70).

HAZEL:

That’s not fetishes again, is it?

TINKER:

No Hazel, it’s about getting good pats.

HAZEL:

That sounds better than the living dead to me, this polydisciplinamory.

TINKER:

Exactly.

HAZEL:

Not zombies?

TINKER:

No.

HAZEL (Fig. 21):

But what does that make us? Are we Pet-o-philes?

Figure 21.

No. We Are Not Pet-O-Philes.

MURPHY:

[Glares.]

TINKER:

No Hazel.

HAZEL:

[Stalking Tinker.] Zombie petophiles!

TINKER:

We are poly-puppy-amorous. We are disrupting productivity in our everyday [and Dan and Stacy’s research] lives, following desire and building space for experimenting in “unpredictable directions” (Loveless, 2019, p. 70).

HAZEL:

Oh! I like the sound of that!

TINKER.

Me too. Me too.

HAZEL (Fig. 22):

Hey! Dan and Stacy are winding up that Zoom call. Let’s do some Zoomies behind them on the couch, just to be sure they hang up and take us for a walk!

Figure 22.

Stacy and Dan, Tinker and Hazel at ICQI 2023.

TINKER:

Let’s go.