And I appreciate you teaching your child how to greet dogs! It makes going “walkies” so much easier for everyone.
I don’t want to make it sound like Danny was a problem dog-- he wasn’t. The rescue he came from thought he was abused by a previous male owner, so strange guys didn’t always get a friendly reaction, and I knew it. Women were good, he loved children, and other dogs were fine, unless they played a little too energetically-- and at the first hint of growl I’d swoop in and pick him up. So I was very choosy about who got to pet Danny. But he was already leash-trained, and I put in extra effort to make sure he knew how to share a sidewalk. If someone approached, I’d steer the dog to the opposite side of the walk, or have him sit and stay and “look nice” as people went by… and he did. In five years of daily walkies that was the only incident we ever had. (Sorry for the slight derail, but I miss my poor boy and couldn’t resist the story.)
So (steering back on topic) rules can help everybody, people and dogs. And yes, that poor dog did look kinda uncomfortable. And heavy.
