How SpiderDogs Created the Universe

I tilt my head up and all I see is a million, tiny little sparkling stars filling the nights sky. I wonder if anyone could ever count exactly how many stars you could see in the sky when you’re in the middle of the country, and there’s no light pollution. It seems like it would be virtually impossible. The sky was full. There was an endless, vast universe above me, making me think larger than life questions. My mind started to wonder…

How are we here?

Why are we here?

Is there life outside of this planet?

The questions that come to mind as I gaze into the nights sky are just as brilliant and inexplicable as the view above me. My mind wonders as it evaluates the possible answers to these big, maybe even unanswerable questions. My mind seamlessly falls into thinking about these type of philosophical questions when I look at the sky during the summer. I feel like I am always on a quest for life’s biggest answers each summer. Each year, the same questions appear in my mind. I have not found any answers yet. I feel almost as if each year, I move further away from the truth.

As a child, I always came up with answers with my imagination. I would ask, how are we here? My playful imagination would create stories of of aliens bringing us to Earth, or us appearing out of thin air. I felt satisfied with these answers. They were playful, creative, and imaginary. They made sense to me as a kid - there was absolutely no limitations to what my mind could create as an answer. As I grew older, my mind leaned more towards the logical side of things, and I found these questions may just be unanswerable. Gone was the creativity my childlike mind once had, and replaced with a logical mind that could never quite come up with the truth. These questions were insatiable, yet I could never stop asking them each and every summer.

As my mind continues to come up with answers, despite knowing I will likely never receive them, I hear music from a guitar and a ukulele playing in the background. My group of close friends from childhood play music as we sit around the campfire on the Summer Solstice.

Each year, like clockwork, we would all gather for a reunion at my families cottage. Those of us musically inclined would play soft music as we sat around the fire each night; those athletically inclined would bring the volleyballs and the tennis rackets… and those philosophically inclined, like myself, would tune out and focus on the bigger picture. Everyone had their role at the cottage, and none of us would ever miss out on coming up each year. We valued this time together as friends. We all grew up with each other, and vowed when we were younger that no matter how far we grew apart and no matter how far life took us, we would always meet at the cottage each year to celebrate the Solstice.

The music playing from my friends felt like a gentle creek flowing all around me; it was soft, relaxing, and peaceful. All I could feel within my body as I heard the strums of the guitar and watched the stars in the sky was relief. Relief from the pressure of school, from the hustle-culture, and from the constant need to do. My mind was able to relax and finally find the time and space to venture beyond the modern day reality and into the world of the unknown universe.

I never talked about my philosophical nature to my friends. I found that my thoughts were very unique; many minds do not venture into such deep thoughts, or have such deep inquiries about life. I typically remain quiet, and stay in my own world. However, I felt inclined to propose one of my questions to my group of friends today. Maybe one of them would know the answer, since I could never come up with one.

“Sorry to interrupt,” I spoke softly, but just louder than the guitar strums so that I was heard.

“She speaks!” Xavier, one of my more extraverted friends joked.

“I do. I have a question…” I began to propose. I looked at my friend group, and could tell they were all intrigued. I didn’t talk too often, especially when we sat around the fire. “How do you think we are here?”

“What do you mean? Like our parents…” Gregory started to joke, before his girlfriend gently nudged him.

“That’s not what she means, Gregory,” Alexandra explained to him. “She is being serious. You know Sarah. She’s always in her mind. Are these the thoughts you always have around the fire?”

“Every single summer…” I responded quietly, slightly embarrassed.

“That’s so cool,” Alexandra immediately said, sensing my nervousness. Alexandra seemed like the type of person to maybe… just maybe have these thoughts every now and then. “I don’t know, honestly. Science would say we evolved from animals. There’s a lot of evidence to back it up. I watched a documentary one time on T.V. about it. How we started as little bacteria, and then eventually, over billions of years I’m sure, grew into animals, and then humans. That’s all I know, at least,” Alexandra offered wholeheartedly.

“I think the Aliens brought us here,” Xavier explained. “It is the only logical answer.”

“Logical!! That makes no sense at all,” Alexandra replied.

“Hey! There’s so many movies about aliens. It could be true. I don’t know. That’s the best guess I have,” he offered.

“What about you, Sarah? You say you think about it ever summer, so how do you think we are here?” Alexandra asked her, curiously.

I paused for a moment, not really sure how to respond. Do I tell them I have no idea? Do I make up some guess like they did? I racked my brain for some logical response, but all I ended up saying was, “I have absolutely no idea.”

Everyone looked at me intently, surprised by my lack of response and understanding on the topic.

“Care to explain?” Alexandra questioned me further.

“I guess… I don’t know. When I was younger I would come up with all of these different answers. But they were all playful and creative, not real or logical. I always want to know the answer to this question. But I just have never been able to figure it out. It seems so complicated,” I explained. After I spoke, I saw my friend Gregory raise his hand. “Yes, Gregory?”

“I know how we got here…” Gregory started to say, as he pulled a package of hotdogs from the cooler. “The SpiderDogs brought us here.”

Everyone erupted in deep, belly laugher. SpiderDogs were the tradition for our yearly cottage trip. Every year around the fire, we would roast them. Back when we were children, and we had to have our parents come to the cottage with them, my dad introduced us to the SpiderDog. A hotdog with little cuts on both ends, so that each end would be cut into fourths, with the middle remaining solid to keep the hotdog together. When you would roast it on the fire, the cuts on each ends would curl up to look like eight legs. My dad called it a SpiderDog.

“I bet they like, created the universe or something. Wouldn’t that be crazy if SpiderDogs were real?!” Gregory continued, before asking the group if they wanted one.

“Oh Gregory. You are so funny. That would be crazy if they were real…” I joked. “I don’t think I’ll ever forget the time that I asked you guys such a philosophical question and it ended up in us making SpiderDogs. You are such kids at heart,” I shared lovingly to the group, before taking my own hotdog and beginning to cut each end into forths. I smiled deeply at my friends, grateful for how humorous and childish they could be. I began to roast my SpiderDog on the fire.

I watched the SpiderDog roasting over the fire, smiling as I watched the little legs curl up as the hotdog started to cook. SpiderDogs were probably the best part of the cottage trip, if not the best part of the entire summer. They were fun, creative, and so tasty. As soon as mine was done roasting, I put it on my plate and began to eat it slowly. You don’t just eat a SpiderDog the same way you eat a normal hotdog. To eat a SpiderDog, you eat one leg at a time, until only the middle is left. It’s more fun that way.

As I began to eat, I started to to reflect on how my friends also didn’t know the answer to my question. More so, I reflected on how Gregory ended up making a joke about the whole question. It made me begin to wonder if the answer to the question of how we are here maybe isn’t so serious at all. Maybe, how we got here was something so random and obscure like a SpiderDog creating all of us and bringing us to Earth. Maybe we are here by some crazy, exquisite happenstance. And maybe, nobody knows the answer to how we are all here on this planet.

But everybody seems to know the answer to the best summer food… SpiderDogs, obviously.

How To Make a SpiderDog:

1.Take a hotdog out of the package.

2. Carefully, using a cutting board and knife, cut straight through 1/3 of the hotdog. Turn the hotdog, and cut once more, creating four legs. Repeat on other side, keeping at least 1/3 of the hotdog without any cuts in the middle.

3. At your campfire, place the centre of the SpiderDog on a long stick (preferably fireproof). Cook, turning frequently, for at least 5 minutes or until desired crispiness. SpiderDog is ready when you can see all eight legs of the dog curled.

4. Take the hotdog off the stick after letting it cool for 1-2 minutes. Eat one leg at a time. It’s more fun that way.