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Monday 5th March 2012
"Oh, shut up, you stupid man."
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The title is what someone said to me today, in a devastating put-down. I'm still recovering. It was lunchtime and I was walking home with R******. We decided to take the alley that runs behind Coulston Road. Up ahead was a large woman, who looked about in her early forties. She had a child with her, about 7-ish, and three massive dogs, none of which were tethered. These dogs were kind of lolloping about in a haphazard manner so I kind of instinctively (no - actually this is based on experience) drew R****** towards me. Sure enough, one of these dogs (almost as tall as R******, and probably far heavier) came right up to R****** and was sticking his nose in his face, sniffing him in a manner that was way too confrontational. I kind of looked at this dog and what it was doing in a bemused manner, wondering how long it would be before the owner asserted control. R****** didn't appear in any distress. As the woman passed by I said, "You know, it would be good if you could actually control your dogs," but I don't think this registered immediately, or perhaps it took a while for her to formulate her words - "Oh shut up, you stupid man." R****** and I stopped at that point and I turned to challenge her, hoping to remind her of how intimidating a dog of that size must look to a child of R******'s size. However the woman carried on walking, shouting as she walked away, "He's only being friendly! What do you want? Would you rather he was biting your son?" Which completely flummoxed me. How do you respond to that? As I struggled for a response, the same dog returned, growling, and again went right up to R****** and sniffed his face again, for good measure. The woman was further out of ear-shot now and as the dog lolloped back to his owner, R****** muttered, "That dog wasn't friendly, dad," and I shouted back towards the woman, "No, R******, you're right, that dog wasn't friendly." I was trying to explain that most dogs weren't like that to R****** and, sure enough, walking towards us was a man taking his dog for a walk with the dog ON A LEAD! Dog owners - what you think is friendly, others don't.
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