I Hope There Isn't Going to Be a Dog Fight
I walk my dogs all year round in all kinds of weather. In the winter, I'm often the only one out there no matter what time of day. When the weather gets nice, though, there are lots and lots of people out walking dogs and working on their yards and just generally engaged in activities at once nefarious and innocent (ok, I don't really know if anyone in my neighborhood engages in nefarious activities, but the odds are someone does).
So, I came home from work the other day and I let the dogs out and let them in and changed my clothes and picked up leashes and treats and bags and set out with Billie to take a walk.
At the corner of my block, I looked down the street and I saw, on my side of the street, a woman with a stroller and a five year old and a dog. The five year old was walking the dog. Also, on my side of the street was a very large Golden Retriever behind a very small fence. On the other side of the street was a woman with a small-ish terrier. As I stood on the corner deciding where we were going to walk that would, possibly, result in the least amount of barking, a little (little, but not young) newspaper girl walked up behind me.
"I hope there's not going to be a dog fight," she said.
"Well, I don't think there is," I told her.
She then pointed out all the dogs that might start a dog fight--the dog in the yard, the two dogs down the street. Plus, she told me, "There are two more dogs over in that yard. And that house right there has a little dog."
"That house has two little dogs," I told her, trying to be helpful.
She turned this new information over in her mind. "Well, I hope there isn't going to be a dog fight," she repeated, her voice resigned, as if she didn't see any way out. There would, inevitably, in her mind, be a dog fight.
At that moment, the five year old let go of the dog she was holding, which came running toward us. I'm sure, right then, the little newspaper girl was thinking, 'Yup, see, there's always a dog fight.' Disappointingly, or luckily, depending on your perspective, it was Sunny, a dog I know, and she did what I expected she'd do--ran up to Billie, laid down and wagged her tail until her owner retrieved her.
Sunny and her people went on their way, the terrier and her owner went somewhere, the Golden Retriever stayed in its yard, the other two dogs stayed in their yards, the two little dogs didn't even come out of their house.
No dog fights.
But I'm thinking this is my new slogan for certain situations; I hope there isn't going to be a dog fight.