Hamster on a Hard Roll

Hamster on a Hard Roll

By J. Glenn Eugster
Fontana Free Press

April 27, 2009



Some days I feel as if I’m inside a treadmill running as fast as I can to get everything done. Many days I never feel as if I’ve accomplished much of anything, more like a hamster treadmill rather than a NordicTrack. Maybe I’ve spent too much time alone and I’m identifying more with hamsters than I should? There was a time when I was sympathetic and supportive of hamsters and tried my best to free them from the way they are stereotyped by people. I’ve long been an advocate for weak and outcast members of society but I must admit that my very brief pro-hamster campaign was a bit out there even for me.



While attending the University of Georgia in the 1960’s, I took a series of art classes which were required as part of the landscape architecture curriculum. The theory was that a good landscape architect needed to know how to design gardens, parks and communities that reflected good engineering and aesthetically pleasing. One class, which was dominated with long-legged, long-haired blonde sorority-sisters from all parts of Georgia, involved a project that required us to create a drawing or painting in motion.



Walking home from class I stopped off for a beer at a local haunt and pondered my assignment. Rolling my eyes while sipping a Berger Beer I decided that I would call upon misunderstood hamsters to supplement my artistic ability and create a moving picture. My plan involved the purchase of two robust hamsters, a treadmill--called a hamster ball, drawing paper, glue, some colored pencils, and more beer. With due diligence I drew multiple, sequential, scenes of a person doing jumping jacks and fastened the drawings around the outside of the treadmill. In front of the treadmill I made a small screen for viewing the drawings as they wheeled-by powered by my two partners, now named Wofat and Maurice.



The day the presentation was due I bundled up my partners and our props and strode with confidence and new found creativity to the Art Department to share this breakthrough in creativity. My presentation was brief, and the critics were concise in their comments and artsy-fartsy smirks. I was of course a landscape architecture student taking art and not to be confused with an art student. Luckily my partners were spared the sharp comments of the jury and were relieved to head back to the kitchen for another run before meal time. Unfortunately once my hamsters returned home Wofat decided to eat Maurice and I never looked at him the same way.



On Thursday’s my wife Deborah and I check the local insert to the Washington Post for news from Animal Watch. Last April 7, 2009 the report read:

“A man surrendered two stray hamsters in a hamster ball to the shelter. The man said he found the hamster ball rolling down the street with the animals inside. Both animals were male, and because male hamsters usually fight, they are generally housed in separate cages. The next day a woman called to report her hamsters missing. She said her children had been playing in the yard with the hamsters and forgot about the animals when they went inside. Later, they went out to look for the hamsters but could not find them. The woman claimed the hamsters and paid boarding fees. She was given an aquarium so the hamsters could be housed separately and was advised to take one of the animals to see a veterinarian about a health issue“.



My guess is that these two hamsters felt the same type of oppression that Wofat and Maurice felt in Georgia. Despite our good intentions people just don’t understand these small but sturdy creatures and their need to get out of the rut they feel they are in. We’d all do well to get off our own treadmills before someone gets creative with us, or God-forbid, leaves us out in the yard and left to our own devices.