An irresponsible dog owner

Guys, this is one story that I had to relay.

On Sunday morning, I was putting a few miles on the North Meck Park trail. When on the back side of the trail, I was coming around a bend in the trail and a dog was standing right in the middle of the trail. His owner was standing about 5 meters behind him. The owner was carrying the dog's leash in his hand but not attached to the dog.

The guy tells me that his dog is friendly, but looking at the dog, I am thinking otherwise. The dog's tail wasn't wiggling. The hair on his back was standing up and the dog was growling at me. Clearly too any sane person these are not the signs of a friendly dog. The owner looks me straight in the face and tells me that I must have spooked his dog. Me spook his dog? I mean, I make a ton of noise running on a trail. There couldn't be any way that I could slip up on his dog. Then, he proceeds to walk right by the dog and me as if nothing has happened. At this point, I guess my mouth must have been standing open in disbelief. He was leaving me facing his growling dog.

I looked around at him. At this point, I am assuming that he is not going to do anything. I mean "GGGGGG" as a dog owner I would have at least expected him to control his dog.

At this moment my awe changed over to frustration and probably a little bit angry. I probably should not have said this but I looked around and told him "You had better put a leash on your dog before one of us gets hurts".

He doesn't even look at me but calls to the dog. A few seconds later, the dog bolts over to the adjoining trail to catch up with his owner.

I run many times on this trail and more often than I care to admit have encountered owners who don't have their dogs on a leash. I have to say in most instances, the owner steps in and take control of their dog.

In this case, I have no idea what this owner was thinking. I just hope that some child doesn't have to find out the hard way of this owner's irresponsibility.

 

Thoughts from the Cool Down Runner

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