The Edmonds dog park is a triangular acre of sand and gravel, bounded on one side by the Burlington Northern railroad tracks, and on the other by the parking area for an adjacent waterfront park. The only side not fenced in is the seventy-five yards of pebbly beach strewn with driftwood logs. Clear days get you a view of the Olympic Mountains to the west but always there are the sailboats, freighters and ferries out on Puget Sound.
It’s an off-leash dog park. You take it off when you go in, and put it back on when you leave.
My wife and I never brought our previous dog, K.C., to the dog park when we moved to Edmonds. He was much-loved but also not very sociable with non-Schnauzers. He lost his sight and hearing. We finally had to put him down. It was a while before we could even think about getting another dog. But the desire crept up on us, by degrees, and that’s when we began visiting the dog park.
We didn’t go in, of course. What was the point without a dog? We would stare through the chain-link fence to watch this circus of breeds within. It was as if we were the ones in the open-air cage, the ones fenced in, and what was going on inside was the freedom of the wider world.
And what was going on inside? Lots of gamboling and galumphing dogs chasing one another, play-bowing to entice a prospective park-buddy, roughhousing with nips and paw-jabs. Lose one pal, find another. We saw posses greeting new arrivals with a carousel of sniffing. And wait a sec, gotta go–and dutiful owners scooping it up. (Very little fudging on that score within the dog park, unlike outside). Everyone seemed to be in a good mood, whether their dogs were successful or not on the agility course and jumps. Who wouldn’t be in a good mood?–doggies at play! Occasionally an owner would have to intercede when his mutt got a little too rambunctious, crossed over the line of play. But for the most part it was: let ’em do what they’d do if you weren’t around.
It’s no great insight to note that we are leashed in so many ways outside the fence. You know the list. All of us strain at the end of the same leashes–and yes, things couldn’t work without them. (Well, mostly). And we all have our personal leashes in addition to the other ones. We’re also now leashed to our sundry electronic devices, yet I’ve never seen anyone at the dog park using a cell or smart phone, or texting. I suppose that’s because in the dog park you need your hands free–to pet your dog or someone else’s, for latrine duty, to wipe the spittle a bloodhound or boxer slobbered over your French bulldog, to throw a ball or stick into the water for your retriever. You can’t simultaneously text and keep watch over your Border Collie to make sure he’s playing well with others, and vice versa.
These devices are precious, I’m told, and could easily be knocked out of your hand if you’re sideswiped by a careening German shepherd chasing a wire-haired pointer. I can easily imagine how one of these things could wind up in some Lab’s mouth, momentarily mistaken for a treat. Which, by the way you should never bring to the dog park. They know you have them. Do you want a Rottweiler pouncing on you for a ‘cookie’? Save them for home; they’re not needed inside the fence. They’re only a reminder of who gets to put the leash back on when it’s time to go.
Anyway, tomorrow is a dog park day for Olivia. She’s our scruffy Lab-whatever rescue puppy, almost eight months old, and she’s been there fifteen times now over the last couple of months. She recognizes the route, and as we get closer she starts to make whimpery noises. Of expectation? The leash coming off for an hour? Is she thinking that some of her pack-pals will be there? She knows their smells; we know their names: Coco and Captain Nemo and Ghenghis.
For Olivia, it’s the closest she’ll get to what she once was. Maybe for us, too.
