More Walking- In Company

The weather has turned from oppressive to mild and we're back to the seasons of walking. I would like to work more walking into my life and currently I'm trying the evenings. But it is getting dark earlier and earlier, so there are several considerations to balance.

Last night I walked for about 45 minutes around our neighborhood. We have widely spaced street lights and narrow twisty hilly streets with no sidewalks. There were lots of cars I had to dodge, but almost no people. I listened to my book and walked very very fast.

I missed having my fierce overprotective dog with me. I have a dog partly just for walking at night. When I got her, part of my criteria was a dog big enough to give bad people second thoughts about approaching us. I am very mindful that I live on the edge of a big city and I am a small woman who could be seen as an easy target.

When we are the only ones on the surface if the planet, my dog is a total joy to walk with. She stays by my left side, sniffing as she goes but keeping that holy grail for dog walkers, a loose leash with plenty of slack - in the eight feet that is all I allow her to range.

This is a very dog friendly neighborhood and it is rare for us to be the only ones out. My own sweet snugglepuss becomes a raging, slavering, mindless ball of lunging snarling fury when other dogs are around. I have worked with trainers and on our own for years, and only reached an uneasy balance that is a lot of work to maintain. I understand her psychology and physiology, and I know how to act. But it is a lot of work to do things right.

I have to be hyperalert to my surroundings. I have to load up my pockets with plenty of high quality treats. I have to react before my dog does, leading her into a positive behavior (eating a treat) before she begins the negative behavior (aggressiveness). And so when it's light out and I feel safe and I'm likely to see many other dog walkers, I often just leave her behind (with a combined sense of guilt and relief).

But if I'm embarked on a new campaign of night walking, it's time to try again. I just didn't feel comfortable on my own last night without her. So tonight, I gave her a try. Nice and easy, no iPod, just around the block. At the second corner, there were some people coming, so we wheeled around and headed back the other way. No anxiety on her part. We ended up doing three circuits, a good 20 minutes, with another reversal to avoid folks.

Dogs are total creatures of habit. If I take her out again tomorrow, by Tuesday she will be expecting it. In a previous decade in a different big city, with a different large dog, I was building up strength for a backpacking trip with night dog walks. Often, what got me off the couch and out in the subzero weather was my dog's unwavering conviction it was the right thing to do. Living up to a dog's expectations makes us better people, and I hope in my case, a more fit one.


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