Ruminations

When the Internet was stretching its fledgling wings as a mode of communication, relatively few had access to it. In those early days, it was mostly academics or librarians -- and those are people with a natural affinity for the written word. Gradually, mailing lists were created to invite people whose lives were far flung to join as one, gathering around a cyber-table and sharing their passions. And again, these tended to be people who loved words, and loved to write them.

The very first Internet home for the Boxer fold was the Boxer Mailing List. It's likely that only twenty or so of those who currently make the Showboxer List their home were there in that first year or two. And a great percentage of those were the writers currently seen on the SB-L -- those people with passionate convictions who feel a call to share them. People whose minds are such that they're intrigued by this medium in a manner that compels them to offer much more than show reports or litter announcements.

On the Boxer Mailing List, I cut my teeth as a writer. In fact, I discovered that, more than perhaps anything else in my life before or since, I felt I was meant to be one. That's where I believe I and those like me differ from some who submit their offerings to the SB-L, more than a decade after these communities first congregated.

Many now on board the Showboxer List appear to be there soley to share and read litter announcements and show resports. Those are useful things, and there's certainly no shame in that being one's focus. But others of us try to hold on to that experience we had so long ago when we began describing our lives with our dogs via the Boxer Mailing List.

We on the original BML used to rejoice in each others' work. Every day, we could look forward to what would be shared on the topic of our ardor and dedication. We were pet people and show people and breeders, but we were more similar than we on the Showboxer List are now -- and that was due to our desire to express what we saw going on in our dogs' lives.

Some of what I wrote way back then is preserved on the Minstrel site because I miss those days. I miss the easy acceptance of the joyful description of our dogs, and the almost familial encouragement to articulate it in prose. Maybe you've never seen the sort of essay to which I refer. If not, please click on "BML Story Posts" in the menu on the left. They should offer you an accounting of what we were doing back then, and what I, personally, try still to be about now.

What we're about -- who we are and why -- is the subject of *this* essay. Having tried to get through a week's assaults by certain unhappy people who prowl the Showboxer List has been difficult. That's because of the way those we care about and believe in have been painted of late is so starkly incorrect, and the reasons behind those portraits so hideously unfair.

When I write about the influx of UK breeding stock into this country, it's not advertising. I don't make money selling Boxers, nor does anyone with whom I'm associated. When any of us writes about our dogs - -their qualities, their successes -- it's because we love to share them. Not because we hope to create some market for the next best thing.

Those who see what we do that way must be of that mindset themselves. I'd caution anyone to steer clear of them for that very reason. Whether it's a profit motive, personal emotional issues or simple jealousy -- basing one's commentary and actions on any of those doesn't make for a healthy, sound breed.

We are really not the bad guys here. The bad guys are the ones who can't celebrate our delights with us. And the *really* bad guys are those who not only interpret our motives and activities incorrectly, but who then go on to try to hurt us based on those erroneous assumptions. Based, I have to assume, on the lack of delight and/or success they find in their own experience in Boxers. Or in human beings, in general.

Someone is right, here, and someone is wrong. If you have not been party to events, you *cannot* make judgments about others. This recent set of circumstances has left me wondering how to continue to look for the best in the people who make up the Internet Boxer community, and how to continue wanting to share my joy in what I do. When some here can spend inordinate numbers of hours scanning the SB-L for the e-mail address of all who evince support of what we're doing, then assail them behind the scenes with libelous fiction, and even inspire others to join their awful quest, imagining that gets hard. :-{

I understand why some are threatened by the influx of UK and Continental Boxers, and even more so because of their success in the whelping boxes and the show rings of the United States and Canada of late. These folks like the look of the North American lines they've created, and they're unhappy to be staring change in the face. It's not a change they asked for, so it's troubling. All change is hard on the people it happens *to.* Even when it's actually for the better.

What would be good, here, would be for us not to give in automatically to the temptation to place the least favorable interpretation possible on an event or a story or even an entire human being when faced with them. We'd be a happier lot if we *all* were able to avoid that all-too-human practice.

Meanwhile, we're all here for differing reasons, be they subtle or stark. For some of us, the passion inherent in the thing is to win. For others, it's to effect change. And how we're received when we express that passion, however it is that we express it, says a great deal about our own particular templates where our lives are concerned.

For example, if a policeman shoots an un-armed man and the man's parents sue for $80 million, some of us will say "Here, here! It can't bring back their son, but at least policemen may think twice the next time..." But some others of us will say to *them*selves: "It can't bring back their son. They must see this as a way to make a quick fortune."

Same set of circumstances. Widely different interpretations. Both based on who the observer is inside, as a person, him- or herself.

In the current instance: When we say that Kti Jensen of Global Boxers is doing what she does for the love of it, we're telling the truth. But some will still be convinced that nobody ever does anything for that reason. They must be profiting in some way. Yes. Her "profit" is knowing that she's made a difference in the future of the breed here. That's all this is about.

Some people simply want to help make others' dreams come true. Others feel a compelling urge to stop them from doing that. Nothing could be a sadder expression of one's own psyche.

It's all about perspective. Who we are dictates entirely how we view the others who people our world.

Here is the fact of the matter where I and my friends who are inspired by UK Boxers are concerned: Doing what we do -- importing, sharing, getting the word out -- is as far removed from a profit motive as anything you're ever likely to come across in this game. The reason to do this -- all of it -- is for the absolute joy of it all. The finding of beauty in something different. The revealing of it to others. The thrill when it's accepted in the show ring and the whelping box. The belief that this new blood may just make an enormous difference to the type and the longevity of the breed in North America. The delight in discovering people who think as we do. And recently, the relief when so many of those people refuse to allow us to be misunderstood, and take up the cause for us.

But why should that last have to happen?

If you see in our pursuits ANYTHING other than the passion and the excitement I've described, I suspect your personal experiences have inured you to the joy that's there for the taking when we involve ourselves with this breed. I can't change that. As the saying goes: "If you don't get it, you don't get it." But the very least you could do is refrain from making awful, judgmental statements -- both on the stage and behind the scenes -- that are not only discouragingly and seriously inaccurate, but damaging to one very good person's soul.

If that's your motive for being involved in the breed -- the titillation that great, gossipy stories offer -- keep it up. But when you do, your colors will show clearly, and good people will reject you for it. I believe the past week has proved that to many once and for all.

Don't be a part of the reason that good-hearted, passionate people leave the breed. Instead, be a part of the reason they stay. Ask yourself before you type that initial sentence or utter that first word which of the two you're doing. Ask yourself if your motives are honest and kind. Ask if you really know what you're talking about. Consider whom you believe, and why you do.

If you ask yourself those things every time, the Boxer family will be richer for it.

And remember this probably most important thing: You, yourself, are not immune to the same treatment you mete out to others. What goes around does come around eventually. "The truth will out."

Katherine Nevius
Minstrel Boxers
boxerkate@verizon.net
http://www.minstrelboxers.com