I moved out of the centre of the City St. John’s many years ago. I loved the city, and I still do but it was just time to go. Now I live in the country, well sort of. The area where I grew up in the inner city is still home to many, but you have to boot the syringes out of your way if you are walking home these days. I didn’t move into the wilderness or anything like it. My property is in a wooded area near a pond with a nice, paved road that you can walk around. It is less than a half hour drive into the city. My house is also next to a nice park.

I have written about the area a number of times over the years and perhaps I have made it sound more “rural” than it actually is. A relative of mine was in hospital a few years ago and someone on the ward having read some of the things that I had written thought that I somehow lived “off -grid”. I don’t. I guess I wrote too often about having a wood stove and a well and having to shovel snow off the roof in the winter.

To the matter at hand. I love walking “around the pond” near where I live but there is a problem. So does everybody else like walking around it including people who come from elsewhere. They come to walk their dogs. they are most certainly welcome. The trees are nice and there are lots of walking trails and there is plenty of room. The problem is the dogs.

Dogs HAVE to be walked and not just on nice sunny days. They have to be trotted around in the rain and the snow and on Easter Sunday and Christmas Day. They require a lot of attention. I have two cats. They require no attention. They don’t even like me. They chase mice and they have a litter box. There is no litter box for dogs, at least none that I know of.

The burghers of our little town, in their wisdom, have provided lots of “Poop and Scoop” signs for dog owners. It is reminder to those who are walking Fido or King (they are all called Fido or King) to clean up after them. The town even provides for free little plastic bags through dispensers in several places around the pond and on the road. I have seen people use them for their dogs, but I also have seen people NOT use them and it seems to be getting out of control.

As an astute observer of The Passing Parade of life my observation is that when darkness falls so do the “poop and scoop” numbers. I know this because I walk in the morning down the road and at first light of day you have to be careful because there are no sidewalks, and it is obvious not everybody is following the rules. I walk on the pavement, if possible, because just off the road you can sink to your ankles. When I am driving on the road, I used to be kind of “miffed” at people walking on the asphalt rather than on the gravel, but I understand the situation better now. If you walk on the pavement you won’t walk in dog poop.

Another observation is that where there are trees that hide the road from people in houses. For the dogs that means BOMBS AWAY! It gets messier along “the Kings highway” as Joe Smallwood used to call it. The moral imperative to pick up after your dog seems to fall off depending on the number trees and bushes between houses and between the houses and the road.

On the nice walking trails through the park things seem to get worse. There are patrols in that park, but I have never heard of anyone being arrested or getting a ticket because a dog “soiled” the path. Actually, it is the owner who is person responsible not the dog. Book him Danno! Illegal poop.

My hero on the trail and the road is an elderly gentleman with a shortened hockey stick that he carries all the time while walking. The stick isn’t taped so I gather it is not for hockey. I have watched him sling dog turds from the road and the trail into the woods. He does it well which leads me to believe he once knew hockey. He also shoots pretty hard and in the right direction which is into the woods.

My final thought now is a positive one. All the ankle-deep dog crap notwithstanding, it could be worse. You know why? Because I don’t have to boot syringes out of my way. Walking on dog poop is still way better than walking on a syringe.

You can contact Jim Furlong at [email protected]