Now, I\u2019ve got some reason for my feelings: Max is (for the most part) a well-trained dog who understands how to behave in public spaces.\u00a0 <\/span>And there\u2019s little pleases me more than seeing other well-trained dogs sharing public spaces.\u00a0 <\/span>People, mostly, are happier when dogs are around.\u00a0 Lord knows, this world needs more happiness.<\/p>\n Last week, however, I had to reevaluate my position on, \u201cdogs, yay!\u201d<\/p>\n Because of a change in my schedule, I went to a different farmers market than I usually attend. This one was slightly smaller, and it was all packed into one street. Which was a complication, but they\u2019d laid out the pedestrian traffic lanes pretty well.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n But because of the location, and perhaps because of the neighborhood it was situated in, they were a number of people with small children, and dogs \u2014 and occasionally small children and dogs. They were also, because of the location, a great number of people sitting at caf\u00e9 tables outside of restaurants and stores, watching the crowds go by.<\/p>\n This was a little problematic for me, for reasons of Covid and crowd trauma.\u00a0 <\/span>But it was outdoors, people were mostly-masked, it was fine.<\/p>\n But.<\/p>\n There were too damn many dogs.<\/p>\n These were good dogs, as far as I could tell.\u00a0 <\/span>They seemed to be well-behaved, and completely under their owner\u2019s control. Normally I would consider it an excellent example of why dogs and humans should be allowed to interact.<\/p>\n But.<\/p>\n There were just too damn many of them for one already-crowded street.\u00a0 <\/span>Every step, another dog, every turn, another dog.\u00a0 <\/span>Dogs under a barrage of noises and smells, including the doubtless distracting smells from the food booths.<\/p>\n And people being careless<\/i> about where their dog was poking their nose.\u00a0 <\/span>Yeah, your dog may be the friendliest thing that ever wagged.\u00a0 <\/span>But you still need to pay attention to what’s going on.<\/p>\n So there I am, being hyper alert, and I could feel Max starting to stress, partially because she could sense I was worried, but also partially because she wanted to play with a lot of the dogs, and they wanted to play with her, but she knows that market time is not playtime.\u00a0 Probably a lot of other dogs had the same tug-of-war going on behind their big brown eyes.<\/p>\n There\u2019s only so much you can ask a dog\u2019s brain, and its desire to please you, before something\u2019s gotta give. And when something gives in a dog, you get stress, and when you get stress you get barking, and occasionally you get biting.<\/p>\n So we did our shopping and got the hell out of there.\u00a0 <\/span>And I won\u2019t be going back.\u00a0 <\/span>Because hell yes, I\u2019m leery of crowds these days.\u00a0 <\/span>But sometimes it\u2019s not trauma.\u00a0 <\/span>Sometimes it\u2019s just knowing the odds.<\/p>\n So fellow dog owners, real talk: our dogs don\u2019t have to go everywhere with us.\u00a0 Honest.\u00a0 <\/span>And if you just gotta<\/i> take them with you to the weekend market, deputize someone to wait with them outside the market while you wander in and out of the booths.<\/p>\n
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