Disney has shown us that love can be anything. It can be a somnophilic kiss. It can be a handprint on a mailbox. And, in this case, it can be a meatball shared between street dogs.
“Lady and the Tramp”, for those of you who don’t remember, is a touching love story between purebred lapdog Lady and stray mutt Tramp. It’s an Aladdin-style tale of the rich girl getting swept away on a blue-collar trip by a cute homeless guy. Happens to us all.
The animation? Nostalgic. The voice acting? Phenomenal. The characters? A little racist if we’re being honest with each other, but there was hardly a culture they didn’t make fun of, so maybe we look past that one.
Besides, the character development was downright impressive for an animated children’s film. Lady and Tramp are perfect foils for one another, and they both become a more well-rounded pooch for having known the other.
Jerome K. Jerome once wrote that “fox-terriers are born with about four times as much original sin in them as other dogs.” Tramp, then, being a terrier mutt, must be at least one-fourth fox-terrier.
Obligatory English major digression: in that quote Jerome was referring to Montmorency, the eponymous dog in his novel “Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog)”. I highly recommend it if you’re into 1800s English satire or, more generally, fox-terriers harassing the British.
“Lady and the Tramp” is a beautiful film because it perfectly captures being in love — it’s all about the little moments. There’s no serenading scene, no huge confession, no slow narrative exposé. Instead, we get snapshots.
We see Tramp wake up before Lady and snuggle up to her instead of running off. We see him stalling on the walk back to her house to spend more time with her. We see the hungry-lean street dog who’s at least one-fourth fox-terrier offer the last meatball to his lady love instead of taking it for himself. And I think that’s beautiful.
So, this Valentine’s Day, I hope you can appreciate the small things. The unspoken ways that the world, and the people in it, say “I love you” all around us.
Happy Valentine’s Day, Ags. I hope you all find someone who would give you the last meatball.
Charis Adkins is an English senior and opinion editor for The Battalion.
