nin137

Nick's Journal
2009-03-14 18:21:15 (UTC)

People at the Dog Park are Fucking Crazy

i have a love/hate relationship with the dog park. i love
the fact that all these dogs can come together and just hang
out. when you are there you really feel this hippie
community/comrade spirit amongst all the dogs. i love
watching my dog run through the water, wrestle with other
dogs, and just streak across the muddy embankment towards
the open water.

what i hate about the dog park are the owners. you see, the
dogs are all pretty chill, but once in a while you get a
neurotic owner. ironically enough, it's never the lady who
looks like she's wearing a burlap sack, pushing a dog in a
stroller while being followed by 15 other dogs that's crazy.
nope, it's the girl who looks like she just got back from
shopping for a wedding dress with her 7 bridesmaids or the
guy who looks he just got out of the office.

the problem with the latter people is that they don't
understand the dogs like the former. sure the burlap sack
lady is probably really weird in any other environment, but
in the dog park, she's the most normal person there.

really there are many different types of neurotic dog
owners. the first is the kind who gets mad when my dog
steals their dog's toy/tennis ball. see, my dog loves to
take another dog's toy because he loves to be chased. so
when he picks up the ball he's thinking:
"this is gonna be hella fun, this dog is going to chase me
to get his ball back."
not:
"boy this is gonna piss of this owner something awful!!!"

unfortunately people take personal offense to my dog
"stealing" their tennis ball. they'll give me sour looks
and roll their eyes. they'll yell exasperatingly at me and
the dog and ask me if i ever took him to training. to which
my only response is:
"he's not doing it to make you mad, he simply loves to be
chased."

then there are those owners who are overly protective of
their dog. maybe it's because my dog is an 80 lb. german
shephered, pit bull, rottweiler mix, but i don't feel like i
need to protect him at all. the simple fact is that dogs
only need your "protection" in one instance...when a fight
is about to break out.
other than that, if you think your dog is being "bullied" or
"being played with unfairly" you're probably just an idiot
and should keep your trap shut.

a prime example of this personification happened a few weeks
ago. my dog was playing "tug of war" with a dog a quarter
of his size. now two things were happening:
(1) the smaller dog was always winning; and
(2) when he did win, rather than flee the scene with his
precious toy and get away from the "bully who was trying to
take it" he would run back towards my dog and shake it in
his face teasingly asking him to tug it again.

of course the family (and the gathering crowd) that was
watching this didn't see it that way at all. the father of
the family started really getting on my case:
"your dog is a bully."
"no he's not, they're playing."
"NO! obviously they are NOT playing, my dog wants his toy
back and your dog is trying to take it from him."
at that point his dog broke loose with the toy (once again)
to which the father said:
"come here bailey!!! come here from that nasty dog!"
to which bailey responded by charging at him, making a
u-turn in the dirt right in front of him and careening back
towards my dog.

the father was outraged:
"BAILEY!!! BAILEY YOU COME BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!!! THAT DOG
IS GOING TO TAKE YOUR FAVORITE TOY!!!!"
this guy was insane. then he started "teaching" his kids
about bullying saying things like:
"see bullies are even around in the wild."
to which i of course had to respond.

"no actually this isn't such a situation. you see the great
thing about dogs is that they don't really work off of size.
there really isn't such a thing as bullying in the dog
world. you see dogs have all of these signs to show either
aggression or submission. that's because dogs HATE to
fight, because they understand how horrible it can be."

to this the father glared at me:
"well what do you call that?"
he pointed towards my dog who was currently chasing his dog
who was once again play-bowing and asking my dog to once
again tug on his toy.
"do you ever play tug of war with your dog at home?"
"of course, but that's different, we're playing."
jesus christ.

but of cousre the best one was the lady who brought her 9
month old boxer puppy to the dog park. while her puppy was
playing with other she feverishly tried to interject herself
(always a bad idea).
at one point she started screeaming at me and the other owners:
"my dog DOESN'T WANT TO PLAY!!!!"
really? that's why he's racing towards all the other dogs
and play-bowing to them?

people are just too overprotective of their dogs. it makes
for neurotic animals. just leave them be, they know their
world better than you can ever hope to.




Ad: