The Little Things

Hi!

While walking Oscar this morning, I saw a woman who was allowing her dog to roam free. This bugs me. Not just because there no way I could do this with my dogs, but because it's illegal and it's unhealthy. If you own a dog and you really believe that it needs to able to roam free, then go to a bark park or move to Montana. Where I walk Oscar is in the middle of our block. There is an elementary school to the southwest of Amberwood Park, shown in the map below.



This woman was doing some kind of slow lunge step across the grass while her dog roamed the park behind her. As I was passing, I said, "You need to clean up after your dog." The woman said, "She never poops" and followed me toward where she assumed her dog was. She repeated this as she walked the 100 or so yards back, then started asking me where "it" was. I told her I didn't see for sure, but it's not my responsibility to look after her dog. She gave me an attitude-filled look and walked off. Honestly, I didn't see anything, but the fact that was so quick to believe me tells me that "never" is probably more like "not always."

This is the problem. Everyone who lets their dog roam free in the park and on the school grounds is convinced that their dog isn't contributing to the multitude of piles of "it" all around. Clearly it's not just one dog, so most of these people are wrong. This is an example of a lot of little things leading to one big thing. It's also a problem in our society as well.

Too many people have the idea that what they do doesn't matter because they're only one person, but it does. When one person does something, it opens the door for others to think it's okay, too. When two do it, then more will soon follow. Soon, "everyone" is doing it so it must not be all that bad. We need more people to step up and refuse to contribute their little things to our big problems. This goes not only for small-scale problems like "it" in the park, but also big-scale problems like global warming and the global financial crisis. If everyone does their own part, then no one has to do it all.

Thanks,
Matt