Rap Sheet (First
published in DOJ, 2004)
“Two’s Company, Three’s a Shroud” or “What the Bush Administration Could
Learn from a Fish”
by Alan J. Gerstle
This all started on a fluke. It was simply a matter of adopting a fish. Little
did I know it would lead me into the treacherous and enigmatic waters of life,
death, the complexities of evolution, and the hazards of competing ideologies.
The fish in question was a Betta Splendens, or as nearly every school kid knows
this species: the Siamese Fighting Fish. It was bequeathed to me by the
daughter of an acquaintance—a pleading twelve-year-old girl. The family was
moving from a gritty tenement just off of Broad Street to a land I mentally
associated with tobacco, moonshine, Davy Crockett, and Al Gore: the State of
Tennessee.
This particular specimen was housed in a small bowl atop a dresser in the young
lady’s room. It was provided by her sixth-grade class: the objective being a
science experiment. Aja (the girl) was required to keep a log of the fish’s
behavior and provide a written report at the end of the term. But now she was
changing schools and residences midstream. So the fish needed an adopted home.
I volunteered to be the stepfather. When I was Aja’s age, my own room was a
menagerie of fish, reptiles, and amphibians. So I saw this opportunity as a
means to connect to my youth. That was the initial blunder in what was to
become a comedy of terrors.
First off, I didn’t want the colorful, broad-finned creature to be confined to
a bowl, so I trekked to my local tropical fish emporium and purchased a modest
five gallon aquarium, a filter, and small air pump. Was I being indulgent? I
noticed all the Bettas on display were in their little round glass universes
without even the luxury of filtration or air bubbles. I assumed this was
because they were being housed temporarily. Besides, Bettas had to be kept
isolated. They didn’t earn their martial moniker for nothing. I even invested a
couple of dollars in a pamphlet-thin manual entitled Know Your Bettas (I
wouldn’t hold my breath in anticipation of the screen adaptation).
What I learned from the book—something that had perplexed me for decades—was
just why Siamese Fighting Fish could be kept in such confined quarters, in
still water without the luxury of constant aeration as other tropical pet fish
seemed to require. It turns out that the Betta has a hybrid breathing system.
The fish have the requisite gills as other fish do, but also possess an
accessory breathing mechanism called a “labyrinth,” which permits it to breathe
atmospheric oxygen directly. So, if you’ve ever watched one of these creatures
for more than a few minutes, you have probably seen them dart up to the surface
of the water to gulp down some fresh air and exhale exhausted air. This
evolutionary mechanism may be just the ticket for their natural habitat, which
is in the shallow rice paddies of Southeast Asia, and where the water is still
and shallow. If it’s still, there’s not a whole lot of oxygen in it, and its
shallowness allows quick trips for a hit of O2. In fact Bettas are
of the sub-order Anabantoidea, which derives from the Greek verb anabaino,
meaning “to journey up.”
As I observed my new ward, I envisioned its geographically distant cohorts
thriving alongside Asian rice farmers, pants rolled up, bamboo hats shading
them from the sun. But now that I had rigged up my aquarium, had basically
gentrified the Betta’s living conditions, I found myself venturing into new
territory.
Like any ecologically-correct aquarium owner, I went out and purchased a
catfish for my tank. A catfish serves as a living vacuum cleaner, poking and
prodding its little snout and whiskers in the gravel to find bits of uneaten
food, which would otherwise decay. My particular “cat” was about three-quarters
of an inch long, silvery with little black spots. As the pet shop clerk netted
him from his temporary residence in the store, I couldn’t help feel a bit
reluctant as I noticed that his brethren seemed to scurry along the bottom of
their aquarium synchronically—in perfect harmony as though they were all one
organism—the aquatic equivalent of a seasoned urban street-cleaning team. I
feared that I had rudely taken my guy away from his school, and into an
isolated existence.
To my surprise, my catfish took immediately to its five-gallon domain,
scurrying along the bottom like an enthusiastic puppy. Mr. Betta ignored the
lowly creature, leaving its bottom-feeding bliss undisturbed. Things seemed
fine with the whiskered guy, but not with me. Siamese Fighting Fish are natural
loners, but the catfish seemed odd on his own. The school of catfish in the pet
shop seemed absolutely gleeful in their group behavior. It seemed mine had
become a fish out of water. It was then I decided he needed a companion. So a
few days later, I went back and brought home a companion. As a team, they
seemed to function synchronically, just as the school of fish had behaved in
the pet shop aquarium. As one dislodged the food, the other conveniently
consumed it in the back draft. Then they would switch roles. What synergy! What
harmony! I had created a balanced ecosystem: a Kingfish who dominated the upper
regions of the aquarium and the two subjects below—all part of a contented
triad.
But not for long. It turned out that the Betta grew more and more dissatisfied
with the setup. He began to chase and prod the newcomer, becoming more vicious
each day. Eventually, he attacked the poor catfish with such malice, the new
guy—after constant harassment—turned up dead in that bleak dead aquarium fish
way. Where had I gone wrong? The United States had just landed a rover on Mars,
the result of years of planning and foresight, a monumental achievement of
human engineering. I couldn’t harmonize a five gallon environment. As I netted
the deceased catfish out of the tank, the Betta seemed to be saying, “Harmonize
this!”
I wouldn’t give up, though. This had been a fluke. After all, the original
catfish had been left alone the entire time. There was something about the new
guy the Betta just didn’t like. I added a miniature mock-Japanese garden bridge
to the aquarium. I put in some plants: both real and artificial. OK, guys, I
thought, you have plenty of hiding places, plenty of mini-oases and after-hour
sanctuaries to retreat to. By dividing up the turf, I would make comfortable
the Betta’s need for a room of his own.
I returned to the pet store and brought home catfish buddy number two. I was
determined to realize my utopia. I predicted the new catfish would quickly
develop a healthy affiliation with his peer. The Betta could entertain himself
slipping over and under the bridge, playing hide and seek with imaginary
enemies among the plant life. I even put a mirror on one side, so the bully
would have his own reflection to challenge—something that would give him far more
satisfaction than picking on a defenseless peacenik. But to no avail. It turned
out I was a worse colonizer than the executive branch of the United States
government. Bam! It took about a day for the Betta to terrorize the new member
of my water world. The third catfish soon became victim number two. The Betta’s
idea of stability and balance obviously did not conform to mine.
I was baffled. But a dawning realization soon infiltrated the cloud of my
stubborn determination. I was attempting to impose my perspective, my
idealistic vision on a culture I had no business experimenting with. Who was I
to assume I knew the ideal way to create a functioning society in a place where
I was a stranger? In the end, I realized I was merely projecting my image of
what should compose a well-established social order in a realm with which I had
little experience. After failing in my efforts to harmonize a five-gallon
aquarium, a mere forty pounds of water, a territory not much larger than one
cubic foot, I considered the difficulty in divining a way to impose a social
system on a much vaster scale, as America is doing in so many parts of the
globe we truly know little about or have bothered to learn.
I don’t exactly know the motivations for our invasion of Iraq. Perhaps we will
eventually find out. But one thing is obvious: The Bush Administration was
woefully incompetent in analyzing or predicting the reaction of its populace.
Or maybe, like me, it was too blinded by its own agenda to think about it.
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