Introduction

I killed a puppy when I was four years old.

Most analysts will tell you that killing an animal is a sign of a mental health disorder, but I dismiss that. I didn't kill the puppy acting on an impulse to get back at my parents, or to play God, or just to to see what it felt like. I suppose in a metaphoric way, I killed the puppy the way that I killed most relationships, years later, with lovers, friends, and business partners. I killed the puppy trying to give it pleasure that it did not ask for or need.

It was July or August in the town of Plainwell, MI, and I was in the small, enclosed backyard, playing on the swing set that I shared with my three siblings. Since I was alone and there was no need to take turns, I slid down the slide many times, one trip after the other. As soon as I hit the bottom I would jump up, run around and climb the ladder for another turn. I'm sure that it was an exhausting way to enjoy it, but I may have wanted to get in as many as I could in the short period of time that I was left alone by my older brothers and younger sister. I'd also like to think that I was smart enough to know, even back then, that any time spent off the slide meant that the sun was going to beat down on the metal, rendering it too hot for use, thus cutting short my solitary day in my very own amusement park.

Our dog, I've forgotten her name, had had puppies a couple of weeks earlier, and was tucked in one half of a banana box with them, some nursing and some sleeping. The box was in the front corner of the garage, just barely in the shade. I went to it to check on my favorite, the blackest one, the one with the white nose, the one that I was convinced that mom would let me keep. It was asleep. It always seemed to be asleep. I picked him up anyway and tucked him under my chin to pet him. The puppy was squirming a bit, so I knew he was waking, and that's when I had the idea: I love the slide. The puppy will love the slide.

I took the puppy, still waking up, with me into the back yard. I started toward the slide at a careful pace, but I'm sure that I was so consumed with the idea of pleasing this little puppy, of being there when it discovered how FUN life is going to be for him to live in a world where things like slides existed.

When I reached the ladder, the puppy was wide awake. I held him with one little hand as the other grabbed for the rail, hoisting myself up step by step. No more than five steps high, I'm sure that it seemed like Everest, and took a lifetime to reach the top.

I remember setting the puppy on the platform at the top of the slide, then, realizing that he would probably not just walk off of the platform onto the slide by himself, I picked him up. I set him down on the hot metal. He squirmed a bit, out of nervousness, I imagined, but soon he would be convinced at how much fun it was going to be, having the breeze blow his little puppy ears back, and his tongue wagging in the open air. He would certainly want to do it again and again.

I'm not sure what actually killed the puppy. The hot metal that had beaten by the sun for the last 10 minutes, or the fact that he was sticking to the slide, and needed a few little nudges to get him on his way. I pushed him a few times, until he finally rolled over and over down the slide, and onto the sand pit below. I followed him down, and realized that the slide was hot, and thought to myself, that's what I get for not keeping up the pace! Not once did I consider the heat in the regards to the puppy.

What I did realize was that when I reached the bottom, that the puppy was not moving as he should be. He lay on his side, his neck craning like a baby bird. Then, nothing.

"Oh, man," I said to myself. It was a popular phrase in our house when something didn't go as planned. I picked up the puppy and ran him back to the garage, to his mama, and laid him down on the plaid blanket. I may have even tried to hide him under her just a bit. The mama didn't really acknowledge him, just lay there panting in the summer heat, while her babies squirmed and slept.

I don't remember if I thought that the mama was going to nurse her broken baby back to health, or if I was hiding the crime, but I do remember thinking that I had gotten away with something that I did that was terribly wrong. I ran back inside the house, to watch television. Television, then and years later, was the most common way for me to avoid reality.

It was a few hours later at dinner, that my own mother announced that another one of the puppies had died. Apparently, not all puppies were expected to live past a few days. I shrugged. We all shrugged.

"It was the black one," she added.

That's how I killed my first animal. Out of love for him, and a want to bring joy into his life. To entertain him, when he probably wanted to be left alone. It was the beginning of what would be a life of chasing that drug of being admired. The puppy, and anyone else in my vicinity was going to have a great time ALL of the time, and admire me for showing them how to enjoy life. No one was going to be disappointed, and I was going to be the center of attention, because I would ensure that everyone, including puppies, could put their trust in me that if they would hang out with me for awhile, I would make sure that they were going to have FUN.

In doing so, I killed an animal, and didn't feel remorse until years later. I killed an animal and I didn't become a knife wielding psychopath, or an arsonist, or a pedophile or any of the 'ists' or 'philes' associated with unstable mental health. I didn't become a murderer, a rapist, or a thief.

I did become , somewhere along the way, an ego maniac with an overwhelming sense of self-importance garnished with a dangerous need to control everyone and everything. I became a shadow to my inner child, and did whatever that child wanted to do or didn't want to do but was encouraged to do by those around them, all for the sake of entertainment.

I became a rock star.