If You Loved Me, You'd Think This Was Cute: Uncomfortably True Cartoons About You

Introduction

very day it’s the same. I wake up and stumble to the bathroom, return to bed, and am greeted by a delightful sight: The love of my life is on her back, legs in the air, showing me all of her glorious parts. I hover over her a moment, cradle her beautiful head in my hands, and give her a kiss. Then I softly sing while rubbing the insides of her thighs, gently tickling soft parts and peppering her belly with kisses. I can’t help but think, a relationship can only be so bad if every day starts out like this, giving or receiving.

Anyway, enough about my grandmother.

(Eeww …)

(I know … eeww.)

It’s an occupational hazard, apparently, to joke about even the most heartfelt expressions. But I promise, I got to this opening scene only after wrestling with every aspect of the introduction. Should it be an artist’s statement? Do I (pretention alert) try to demystify my process? Should I make it an extended cartoon line, quick and meant for a laugh?

Eventually I settled on sharing my philosophy on relationships, why commenting on them interests me, and (drumroll) what my cartoons are about.

And then, the aforementioned love of my life, my most important day-to-day relationship, my almost thirteen-year-old dog, Zuzu, became ill.

Indeed, she became very ill. And like the dramatic signature dolly zoom in a Spielberg movie, a single image rushed forward into sharp focus and everything else—this book deadline, the introduction I had already completed, my readers, family, friends, and fun—blurred to the background. Personal issues shot from the front of my head to somewhere in “I-can’t-believe-I-was-actually-worried-about-that-thanks-for-the-perspective-land.”

Even from a dead sleep, I had instant, boundless energy and focus at a split-second’s notice when I’d (somehow) sense a shift in her breathing or hear her paw scrape the couch; I spent two weeks on that couch with her. It was the closest I’ll ever come to being a new mother.

It was love to the exclusion of all other thought.

We notice additional relationship examples and try and figure out why they work, or don’t. I’m lucky to be surrounded by some great teachers: My brother, Dean, and his wife, Natalya–still each other’s preferred company. My extended family, Andy and Alex—the rare yin and yang that started as an even rarer love at first sight. My uncle Mike and aunt Frances—married fifty-one years and counting, and they still act like they started dating last week.

Sigh … who am I leaving out (as in, pissing off)? Maria and Chris, Mike and Frances Jr., Marilyn and Maggie, Carolyn and Kenny, Tony and Rob, Richard and Amy, Carolyn and Mark, Hugh and Jim, Mike and Cheryl, Matt and Cas …

And Nick and Zuzu.

I share what’s good and healthy and lasting about relationships with a short, hairy, big-headed, voice-activated, lick-and-waggle machine.

We:

Make each other laugh and wag

Are intensely loyal

Don’t lie

Don’t have or promote fears of abandonment

Trust each other completely

Don’t take disagreements personally

Are not defensive

Don’t hold grudges

Don’t live in a constant state of suspicion or fear

Have and encourage realistic expectations

Assume the other has the best intentions

Look at each other in a positive light

Are calmed simply by just each other’s proximity

Show and receive affection easily

Truly forgive and accept each other “as is,” flaws and all

On a profound level, Zuzu taught me how to appreciate simple things. No gifts, no vacations, no jewelry, no obligatory pronouncements, no apologetic flowers. Sim-ple things—you don’t have to be a cartoonist to delight in a dog’s expressive eyebrows any more than you need to be a painter to delight in the Mona Lisa.

When I come home, Zuzu’s at least as thrilled to see me as I am her. How does one measure the accumulated therapeutic value of being greeted that way, with this simple renewal of love and affection, sometimes several times a day? And what of walking, scratching, and burying my face in her side (what Carolyn calls Deep Fur Inhalation Therapy)?

Do most of us have even an echo of this with our human partner? Why not? What did we miss or rationalize away when we were too enamored discovering we both love football and Thai food followed by whiz-bang sex? Why didn’t trust, humility, and forgiveness carry the same weight as the desire to get married and have kids?

Conflict? Sure. But even that’s love. When Zuzu was an older puppy and ignoring my calls while running toward a busy street, I boomed in the loudest voice I have ever used on her or probably anyone, making her feel her world was coming apart. Ears down and tail tucked, she immediately stopped and morphed into a trembling little ball. I consider it one of the greatest, most overt acts of love in my life.

Today, our biggest disagreement is about which way to go at an intersection: the long walk or the really long walk?

Indeed, things that annoy or disgust me in others I find beautiful in her. Snoring. Staring. Loud eating noises. Bad breath. Toenails clicking on the floor. Bed hog. Watching her poop … and then picking it up.

Oh, you say, humans have the advantage of complex and sophisticated interactions, psychological and spiritual connections? And what of stimulating chats, intimate dinners, museums, ballgames, love letters, and whatever else requires an intelligent brain and thumbs? How about the shared life experience and the profound growth that can come with those bonding times? What about sex?

Well, if these uniquely human qualities aren’t resting on a foundation of the kind I share with Zuzu, then they’re all just conversation, temporary at best and a soul-polluting slog at worst.

So I suppose, in the end, my cartoons are about what happens when people chase the shiny things offered by romance, and overlook or just neglect the foundation: simple, sweet affection. It should be nonnegotiable in any healthy relationship.

My cartoons are about wanting everyone to have what I have with my dog.

—Nick Galifianakis