Do You Feel Lucky?

(and feel free to comment! My older posts are certainly no less relevant to the burning concerns of the day.)

Friday, July 11, 2014

OX OX OX!

I remember when one of my history teachers spoke of "the invention of the ox" as a milestone in human history (agricultural advancement-wise). I was like, what are you crazy? The ox was INVENTED? Picture some babylonian ROBOT OX. But I guess in the old days, the first time somebody got the idea to cut some poor bull's balls off, back then, that entitled you to the laurels of a genius inventor. Eureka.

It's kind of sad: poor bull, castrated to plow some field, but you have to admit - what farmer's going lash his plow to a couple of rampaging BULLS? That's going to get you some erratic rows! Fuck, in fact, THAT'S what they should make the matadors do - that'd be a real challenge.

Speaking of which, I realize the fact that all oxen are castrated bulls may in some people's view tarnish the romantic value of the classic "hugs and kisses" signoff "OX OX OX!" In the minds of some, perhaps the juxtaposition of the image of hugs and kisses and the pain and humiliation of a huge proud ornery beast getting de-balled rings just a little bit fucked-up. For these folks, once they've drawn that association, the next time they get a letter or a card where someone is throwing amorous symbolic oxen at them, they may struggle with it. They may have a hard time trying to see the ox as a bearer of love. But I say screw that - is functioning genitalia the sine qua non of love? Surely it cannot be. Cannot these wounded creatures, these poor beasts of burden, yoked together in their labors, pulling so strong in the same direction, always together in the same direction - are they not, in their own way, fit emblems and paragons of love? And in their own lives, can't they too find love, their own kind of love?

I say we need to be a little more open-minded. Ox Love. Why not?

Bulls with no balls, people. Bulls with no balls. People say "dumb as an ox," but when have you ever heard of anyone say "dumb as a bull?" Castration almost certainly doesn't cause intelligence to drop. I think what we have here is another case of humanity perhaps - not equating belligerence and violent strength with intelligence, per se, but definitely equating docility, compliance, peacefulness...with stupidity.

I tell you this, though. Whoever it was who invented the ox, he or she had some balls. Either before the fact, or after, or most likely BOTH. A simple process in conception, and the formula goes a little something like this:

BULLS
- BALLS
OXEN

Now what I want to know is: did Paul Bunyan do that shit to Babe himself, or WHAT?? I mean on the one hand, who the hell else could have?

And then on the other hand...when he was done, you better believe Paul Bunyan had some big ol' BLUE BALLS. But he probably had those anyway, his neck of the woods was a little short on women his size. The fact he decided to call his trusty companion "Babe" could be a tipoff, here. He probably had to make do with ox love.

2 comments:

Mel said...

One time a couple of years ago I went to a pub in the middle of nowhere in the middle of Australia and sat in front of a framed picture of an ox slaughtered in 1894.

I took a photo of us.

This is that photo.

I never have quite understood the difference between an ox and a bullock.

Jen said...

At least they don't sign their letters GELDING GELDING GELDING.

(By the way, Dogimo, you must go to Pearl's blog immediately, there is a post about bears.)