There is nothing\nmore dispiriting in life to live next to a dog chained up outside. It\nhappened to me once, years ago, and it became so depressing that I\nfinally did something about it because I was losing my heart. Here is\nthe story: I moved to a town and began walking my dogs past a\nneighbor\u2019s home on our way to the beach. I observed the neighbor’s\nbig red dog chained up outside, day and night. The dog had roughly 30\nfeet to run on a one-acre lot and a little ramshackle wood fort for\nshelter. Sometimes the dog would stand up as we passed, but usually\nshe just slept on a mat in the dirt, rain or shine, her head buried\nin a curl. This went on for three months. During that time, I\u2019d\nnever met my neighbor or seen him walk his dog, let alone interact\nwith it. It was possible that the dog hadn\u2019t been off the chain in\nthe all the time I\u2019d been living here. One morning I passed the dog\nand called out to her, \u201cHey, Brownie! How\u2019s it going?\u201d which\nwas odd because the dog was red. She looked up, let out a mean bark,\nthen resumed her curl. From that moment on, I started calling out to\nBrownie every time I walked the dogs to the beach. A couple of days\nafter I started this, she stopped barking, stood up, and wagged her\ntail at our coming and going. As I said, I\u2019d never met my neighbor,\nbut, of course, being a writer predisposed with a keen insight into\nthe human condition who loved dogs, I knew him. Therefore, it was\nsafe to get pissed off. Why couldn\u2019t the neighbor get up fifteen\nminutes early and walk his dog once or twice or week? And how about\nhis wife? Wasn\u2019t it her dog too? The beach was ten minutes away.\nWhy wouldn\u2019t everyone with a dog want to take his best friend to\nthe beach every morning or evening? By chance, one late afternoon, I\nwas walking the Sonny and Ray home after visiting the beach when I\ncame upon another neighbor, Ed, working in his yard. We\u2019d chatted a\nfew times before and he came over and petted the dogs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHey, what\u2019s the\ndeal with that dog chained up over there?\u201d I said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHer name\u2019s\nMaddie. I feed her when Mike\u2019s away, when they go on trips.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHave you ever\ntried to walk her?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cNo, she seems\nsort of aggressive when I get close and she probably weighs a hundred\nand twenty pounds.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt just kills me\nto see her chained up all the time. I don\u2019t understand how people\ncan do that to a dog. You think Mike would let me walk her?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSure. Who\nwouldn\u2019t? Let\u2019s go ask him.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYou mean right\nnow?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhy not? I just\nsaw him drive in.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I walked my dogs\nback to the house and then jogged over to Mike\u2019s house. Ed was\nwaiting by the front door. He knocked and a few seconds later Mike\nappeared and came down few steps to greet us. He looked tired. I\nintroduced myself and we shook hands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHey, I was\nwondering, would you mind if I walked your dog sometimes? I\u2019ve got\na lot of free time and would love to help out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYeah, that\u2019s a\ngreat idea. I hear Maddie bark in the morning at 6:00 or so, and I\nalways say, \u2018There goes Matt with his dogs.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He knew my name and\nI had no idea how. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As we approached\nMaddie, she stood up, wagged her tail, and let out a series of grunts\nand cries. Mike petted her head and we discussed her various traits.\n\u201cI\u2019ve been meaning to get up and walk her,\u201d he said. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhy don\u2019t we\nmeet tomorrow morning and have all the dogs meet. At about 6:30,\u201d I\nsaid. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOkay, see you\nthen.\u201d We shook hands and I said goodbye to Mike and Ed and jogged\nhome. It was on. It was on with a dog!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The next morning,\nMike was ready to go and we walked all the dogs together on leashes\nas a sort of introduction. A little hostility between Maddie and my\ndogs flared briefly, but it was nothing serious. Most humans holding\ndifferent religious beliefs act a lot worse when then they meet one\nanother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At first we walked\nin silence. I gathered Mike wasn\u2019t much of a talker. \u201cMike,\nwhere do you work at?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m a Ranger\ndown at South Beach State Park. Been there for twenty-two years.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat’s\nimpressive. I love that park. You guys do a great job.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We made small park\ntalk for a few more minutes, and then it was time to take the path to\nthe beach, Mike didn\u2019t follow me. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cDon\u2019t you want\nto take Maddie down to the beach?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI have to get to\nwork.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOkay, so I\u2019ll\ngo over later and see how it goes with Maddie.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Later that day, with\nMike and his wife at work, I approached Maddie and she stood up,\njumped in little circles, and wagged her tail. I leashed her up and\nwe headed for the beach. When we reached the sand, I took a look\naround and didn\u2019t see another human being. I released Maddie and\nshe ran to the ocean in a goofy lumbering manner that made me laugh\naloud. She found the wrack line and began gobbling every dead\ncrustacean in sight. We spent thirty minutes on the beach running and\nroughhousing, playing stick and tug. The next morning, after I took\nmy dogs to the beach, Maddie and I hit the sand again. We did this\nfor the next five years I lived in this town and Maddie became my de\nfacto dog. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Perhaps it is worth\nadding that not long after I began walking Maddie, I anonymously paid\nthough a nonprofit organization called Fences For Fido to have a\nfence constructed for Maddie. Fences for Fido’s motto is, \u201cUnchained,\none dog at a time.\u201d (Please donate to them.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There is nothing more dispiriting in life to live next to a dog chained up outside. It happened to me once, years ago, and it became so depressing that I finally did something about it because I was losing my heart. Here is the story: I moved to a town and began walking my dogs […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5745,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[203,5],"tags":[1081,1080],"class_list":["post-5744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bonnie-and-clyde-files","category-meditations","tag-dogs-on-chains","tag-fences-for-fido","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5744"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5744\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5747,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5744\/revisions\/5747"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}