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Centrepiece Online | Fall 2008
A Pig in the Road
by Leslie Purvis ’93
I was thinking about my bad day at work one evening as I was driving home. I had tasted sweet success and bitter failure that day, with both ultimately making me feel sad. I just seemed to be continually feeding my feelings of melancholy surrounding my upcoming birthday. As I approached 35, a debate raged in my head. Overall, I was a success and I was a failure all at the same time, and I couldn’t seem to reconcile the two. In fact, failure was actually weighing more heavily on me at that particular time, especially my glaring failure to start my own family. Yet I had also finally succeeded in overcoming some of the emotional damage that had so greatly contributed to my failure in the first place. So I was stuck, arguing with myself about where I could go from here, when I came upon a pig in the road.
I stopped my car in the middle of the road and just stared at the pig for a moment, primarily because it took me some time to come to the conclusion that it was actually a pig. Deer? Too little. Cat? Too big. Dog? Wrong snout. Giant, mutant possum? Wrong tail. And so, I concluded, pig.
The pig and I both seemed a little stunned and so remained motionless for a time. He couldn’t seem to decide where to go from here either. It eventually dawned on me that I was going to have to point him in a direction for his own good. I honked my horn, and the pig startled but stayed in the same spot. I inched forward and honked again. He moved toward the side of the road but stopped short of leaving it. I turned slightly toward a driveway close to where the pig had stopped and honked again. He finally left the road but then just stood next to the beginning of the driveway, staring at me. He wasn’t far enough off of the road to be out of danger, so I pulled into the driveway, turned off the car, and stepped out to guide the pig farther.
I crouched down, patted his head, and had a talk with him for a minute, so that we could get our plan together. We both eventually found ourselves looking up the long driveway to the top of a hill where a small house and a barn stood. We looked back at each other, as we seemed to reach the same conclusion. I stood up and started walking up the driveway while the pig trotted along beside me. As we were walking, I couldn’t help thinking about my own travels in the last year.
Throughout my 34th year, I had wound my way through the treacherous back roads of my heart and soul. A death I had experienced early on that forever connected my heart skipping a beat with my heart sinking so deeply that I almost couldn’t find it again. A pain from watching someone I love struggle but feeling helpless to ease the burden. A need to apologize to someone long lost for being too inadequate to return his love. A job that continued to energize and drain my soul indiscriminately. But no matter what road I was on, someone stopped, honked a horn, and got out to lead me where I needed to go. Without that someone, I would have been lost.
The pig and I reached the house, and I knocked on the door. Nobody answered. I debated what else to do to help him. I didn’t want to fail the pig by not doing enough for him. That would have echoed my failure at work that day, and I couldn’t have endured that.
As I was thinking, the pig nudged my leg with his snout. He was persistent, nudging a couple more times before turning and walking towards the barn. I watched him for a moment as he continued up the hill and neared the barn. Then I headed back down the driveway. I turned around about halfway down to make sure the pig had stayed put. And there he was, standing on the hill, snorting and bobbing his head up and down. I couldn’t help but smile. I continued down the driveway, got in my car, and drove off a success.
I’m not sure if the barn was actually where the pig belonged, but he didn’t seem lost anymore. Success won out for me that day through some gentle guidance and a little nudging. And so, with renewed optimism, along with a persistent but slightly healthier apprehension for what may lie ahead for me, I was able a few days later to truly celebrate my birth 35 years earlier during the Chinese Zodiac Year of the Pig.
Leslie Purvis ’93 has been a child and family therapist for Seven Counties Services in Shelby County, Ky., for almost seven years. She lives in Eminence, Ky., with her four dogs.
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