Julie Bowditch
I thought I knew my neighborhood.
I have lived here for years. I know which streets connect, which way gets me home fastest, and which landmarks I recognize. As it turns out, there is a difference between knowing a neighborhood and actually paying attention to one.
When I got my dog, Brinkley, my neighborhood changed. Technically, it was the same place, but the way I moved through it was entirely different.
Brinkley is nosy. There is really no more diplomatic way to put it. She wants to know who is outside, what they are doing, where they are going and, ideally, whether they would like to pet her. She needs to inspect anything that has appeared since our last visit and investigate every smell left behind by whoever got there—or peed there—first.
She leads the way on most of our walks, and I gladly follow. Along the way, I started noticing things, too.
I suddenly notice plants in yards I have driven past hundreds of times. I pick up trash. I hear kids laughing. I smile at delivery drivers. We change up our route just because we can, and I find things within blocks of my house that I somehow never noticed before.
A human nose smells flowers at one end of the leash while a dog nose smells something rotting at the other.
We walk. We get exercise and some vitamin D. We talk about our day and what we see and hear—although admittedly I carry most of the conversation. Brinkley is an excellent listener. Even when we have somewhere important to be, Brinkley is oblivious to time, which helps ground me.
Not all of my newfound awareness is quite so poetic. Brinkley is what you might call relentlessly enthusiastic about other living beings. Dogs. Cats. Squirrels. People. She wants to see them, meet them and preferably become best friends immediately. I often quip that she’s never met a stranger.
Her friendly exuberance, coupled with approximately zero awareness that anything bad has ever happened in the history of the world, is a beautiful and unsettling combination. So I pay attention for us both.
I look ahead for other dogs. I notice what’s on the sidewalk before she does. I watch for cars, people, animals and anything else that might require me to anticipate her next move. I keep my phone stowed in my pocket whenever possible, because I am responsible for keeping a trusting creature safe whose impulse control remains, at 2 years old, a work in progress.
Whether this is a Brinkley personality trait or a reflection of her mother’s training skills remains under scrutiny and review. We can revisit that another time.
Paying attention has had an unexpected side effect: I know more about the little world immediately around me. I know the dogs. The humans? Not so much.
One neighbor did a double-take when he saw us walking together because Brinkley looks remarkably like his dog. The dogs eventually met by chance. Her name is Penny. His name? Not a clue.
This seems to be a completely acceptable social arrangement among us dog people. We may see each other repeatedly, exchange pleasantries, and know intimate details about one another’s pets while remaining indefinitely known as “Penny’s dad” or “Brinkley’s mom.”
Recently, while my friends were behaving like normal adults in an adorable candy shop in the Berkshires, I found myself on the floor swapping spit with a handsome blonde stranger named Teddy.
Teddy, for the record, is a dog. A friendly, furry gentleman who looked enough like an oversized Brinkley that I immediately abandoned all remaining social norms on sight. Within minutes, we were all playing fetch through the store while other shoppers obligingly ignored the entire charade.
This is who I am now. Somewhere along the way, Brinkley turned me into a person who notices dogs everywhere—even when she is nowhere nearby. I ask strangers if I can pet theirs. I strike up conversations with people I otherwise would have walked right past.
There is something wonderfully universal about dogs. What’s their name? How old are they? Can I pet them? Suddenly, two strangers are interacting.
I have even caught myself mildly judging people who can pass a happy pup without offering so much as a small smile in its direction. I recognize that this is unreasonable and that not everyone is a dog person. But also…who hurt you?
Maybe that is part of what Brinkley has taught me on all of our shared adventures. A neighborhood is not just the streets you use to get somewhere. It is foliage blooming and leaves changing and families playing. It is the trash someone should probably pick up, so why not you? It is dogs with cute names and their anonymous guardians. It is tiny interactions that make you feel that you occupy a place rather than simply existing in it.
As fall folds us into its unique sights and smells, Brinkley has recently turned 2, and we are deep in our second full autumn together. I find myself looking forward to the cooler walks and vibrant colors—and to seeing what we notice together that I otherwise would have missed.
Before Brinkley, I assumed walking a dog was something you did for the dog. And, of course, it is. But the leash works in both directions.
She gets me outside. She gets me moving. She minimizes my screen time. She makes me slow down, look around, talk to strangers, and pay attention to the place I call home.
I thought I was showing Brinkley her world. It turns out she has been showing me mine.