“I promise, she likes me at home”
Born to run.
The dog park. On a warm, sunny day it’s like ladies night at a college bar: it’s packed, everybody is there to mingle and socialize, but chances are you’re going to go home with whoever you came with.
I like to get Gracie to the dog park as often as possible, which isn’t nearly often enough, partly because I have been busy on the weekends, but also because Gracie likes to embarrass me.
Gracie does seem to like me when we’re in the apartment. She listens to me, follows me around and will even snuggle with me sometimes when I get in bed. When we’re in public, she acts like I’m a perfect stranger.
For example, one weekend afternoon several weeks ago, I took Gracie out to the dog park at Reedy Creek Park. It looks like it’s going to rain soon, but I wanted her to get some exercise before that happens. We barely even got into the gate before she was fighting against the leash to go run around. I could barely control her enough to unlatch the leash. And she was off.
For the next two hours the only attention she paid me is the occasional glance as she sprints past with a pack of dogs chasing her. The grey clouds continued to gather and I see lightning in the distance. It’s looking about time to go home, so I started calling at Gracie. No response, more running. I grabbed the leash and started walking toward her; she ran away. I pulled out some treats; she completely ignored them.
The dog park emptied out some, so I thought she might get bored and want to come to me. No such luck. She’s ran around by herself for another 30 minutes. I finally gave up and just sat down on a picnic table.
I tried unsuccessfully several more times to round Gracie up. There was no reason to try and chase her because she’s unbelievably quick and me running at her would just make her want to mess with me more.
I naively thought I could wait her out. It started to get dark. There were maybe four people at six dogs at the park. It’s starting to be obvious to everyone around me that I wanted to leave, but Gracie didn’t want to cooperate.
Everyone else that leaves just called their dog over, threw the leash on them and walked out calmly. It looked so dang easy. I was jealous.
One of the four people got up to leave, her dogs tagging along behind her. When she got to the gate, I look up and notice something strange: Gracie was standing right behind her, with the other two dogs, ready to leave.
Seriously? Gracie was trying to leave with someone else. Just imagine what the other dog owners were thinking about me: “he must beat that dog;” “does he feed her? she’s so skinny!” “poor thing, he must be awful to her….”
All I could think was, “I promise, she likes me at home!” She does, or at least she fakes it really well.
The lady let all three dogs into the holding area. I ran down to get her. We walked out of the gate, me with my head down and embarrassed, Gracie with her tail high trotting along.
I loaded her into to the car and got in the front seat. She leans forward from the backseat and licks me on the face.
“See!” I wanted to yell, “she does like me!”
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I’m sure almost all dog owners have gone through something like that! I know I have, anyway!