This is indeed reminiscent of those fine days at school, when we used to churn out mediocre autobiographies of everything under the sun, whenever the question paper demanded the same out of us. In this nostalgic atmosphere, I also recall writing ones of Mother Teresa and Adolph Hitler.

Okay, let me cut the crap and come directly to being a dog.

I’m a lowly dog. How did I end up this way? I was born this way. (just as you were presumably born human). And these things stick. You see, you are what you are born, I’m a dog, and life’s a bitch.

Perhaps, the only reason that us dogs do not read or write is because we get so insulted while doing so. Cats can’t because they lack the intellect. We don’t since we are sensitive. There is a story of one of us canines trying to develop some tolerance and started to read what they call the most repeatable author ever to have held a pen, William Shakespeare. And when the forefather dog was enjoying the plot of merchant of Venice, came the lines when someone called someone else rather derogatorily, a lowly cur. My great grandfather wondered what a cur was, and why it was such a curse. On opening a dictionary, he realized that a cur was nothing but a canine, and decided that this world was biased against us dogs. That was just a few days before he was shot dead for biting his master, a deed that he did out of irritation. The ills of education came out then, and we decided that books were not for us.

I am a mongrel. My mom is an mighty alsatian and my dad is a wee daschcund. I wonder why I look so different from the other canines. I recall some cruel passers by calling me an overgrown rat. Rats are smaller animals, that I secretly think might be quite cuddly, but let us let that go, shall we?

I live with a family of humans who seem to think that patting my forehead makes me feel nice. It does. Then there are people who pat my back. That gets quite painful. I resist all temptation to bite them, recalling what happened to my grandfather (the pure alsatian) when he decided to draw first blood.

The person who keeps me is a pretty young girl- well I don’t think that I can pass such a judgement about her independently - but lots of young males that come by tell her that before she slams the door on them (Then they call her a bitch.Wonder why she does not appreciate that). There’s her mother, an ancient lady who has some deep sort of fascination with my forehead. Then there’s her dad who is equally ancient. He’s a lesson is self control, and I resist all the urge to bite him when he keeps his legs on my back as if it were a table. There’s this child (her kid brother) who seems to think that my tail is some sort of a swing. I had quite a harrowing experience when he decided that he would use me as an engine for the skates, and the mechanism connecting him to me was rather primitive, namely my tail. I recall having a tough time then, until the pretty young girl saved me, taking me for a walk, comforing my sore tail and confiding into me her plans to elope (and take me along too) which I seemed to agree with.

One of the main things about us dogs is that we are fabulous listeners. The person telling us the story is always under the assumption that we do not make head or tail of what he or she is saying. But actually we do understand their situation pretty well. We have very analytical brains. We understand all of the problems of the masters. For instance I remember the pretty young girl tell me her fear of rheology and her confusion about quantum mechanics. She told me that she was never able to make the correct substitutions while solving time dependent Schrodinger Equations.

We dogs have our limitations. Though we have really analytical minds, we cannot express ourselves to humans. We lack the communication skills. For instance, I knew all the substitutions that we had to make for the Schrodinger equation to get the solution by direct integration without any approximations whatsoever. Though I tried my best to tell her, the only thing that I made her do was convince her that I was thirsty and she gave me some milk to drink.

In the recent summit between President Musharaf and Prime Minister Vajpayee, one of our stray partners heard all the conversation. He developed a comprehensive understanding of the entire situation. It is said that he had devised a peaceful solution that would be acceptable to both sides regarding the dispute between India and Pakistan. We discussed it with the Pakistani dogs across the Wagah border and they seemed happy about it. But again, our communication skills failed us. We could not tell the stupid humans about it.

Osama bin laden’s great Dane heard the plans to bomb the trade center. The dog was stunned to death. Osama did not even cremate it and ate it raw the next day, intestines and all. But the word was out and American dogs near the world trade center fled the area. We could not get the message across to the humans. No one ever listens to us. No one takes us seriously.

Being a dog has its advantages. We get a lot of gossip from our friends on the street. The gossip is usually very enjoyable. But there are times when we do get into serious fights with each other, but it is better than humans who lose their lives in battles over pieces of land, which will stay there anyway. Have you ever seen a dog die in a fight? Never. We do not. It is our way of saying hello to strangers. Quite enjoyable.

Perhaps it’s time that I stopped this. I know that no humans will ever read this, as we cannot communicate with them. That is a source of so much depression.

I wish that humans would not look at us as mere canines, but as independent beings who have their own free will and thought and stuff like that there. When you are looking into the eyes of a dog, my dear man (at the risk of sounding gay) you are staring at an educated and intelligent creature that is quite dignified and sophisticated, and not at something that does not know anything.

I hope all the readers will look at dogs in a new light now.