A pervert in the park

I have a real love-hate relationship with dogs. I can see that some are darn cute. So much so that I yearn to reach out and pat a wet, black nose. The wagging stump, grinning yellow teeth, and unerring patience make me want to be a dog person. But truthfully, after a harrowing experience as a child, probably like most spinster great-aunts feel about our dribbling offspring, while I can see their likeness factor, I would just really rather not be touched, licked, or peed on by any dog, of the cute or scary variety.

Alan, my sweet determined husband, lives for dogs. He spots them everywhere, and makes up heart-wrenching tales about them for me. He’s indiscriminate, and will pet just about any, barring a pit-bull or manicured lapdog. Together, we have found a middle ground, creating imaginary relationships with dogs (and sometimes also with cats) around the world, which suits me just fine. Years later, we still play silly newlywed sickening games, fantasising about what they are getting up to. There’s Peanut on Koh Phangan, who loves to fish, dig holes in the sand, climb aboard your raft where he’ll puncture the cheap Made-in-China plastic it with his nails, and swipe pottery ashtrays from loungers to chew on privately. He’s probably recovering from this weekend’s full moon party in the shade of a palm tree this very morning. Miss Nuggles, the sweetest kitty in the world, is a member of the Beach Club Resort family on Phu Quoc in Vietnam, where she pinches bread rolls from guest plates over breakfast, doses under hammocks in the sand and mounts hip-high bungalow windows in an escape from sudden afternoon downpours. Today she’s planning a trip to Paris, the capital of baguettes, for this coming summer. Yesterday we met Bolt. She raced past us at Fort Funston, the wildly beautiful beach for dogs south of Ocean Beach in San Francisco. We had taken a daytrip along the exquisite coastline to see what all the fuss around a beach for dogs was about, and to give Alan another serving of his beloved canines. It took me the length of the entire walk to recover from all the leaping, barking, swirling, chasing action. As the Great Dane to my left taught a squirming lapdog his lesson, a posse of retrievers shook their wet tendrils ahead, racing through the waves for a gummy stick. Lucy, a spotted mutt sniffed the black sand, before chasing back up to his master who’d gained some distance ahead in the blinding sun. Even rottweilers named Spike and Spud pranced like naked schoolgirls, amongst twin shaking Italian greyhounds.

But it was Bolt, the gleeful blond labradoodle, who captured our attention, as she streamed past. She spent the full half hour sprinting manically and ecstatically in opposing directions, forgetting to stop to catch her breath. Her perm splayed back beautifully like the model in a TV shampoo ad, she galloped past, turning to catch us in the corner of her eye, checking we were watching. Her mistress looked a little shamed, like the mum of an overly aggressive toddler who’s caught pinching his friends in the sandbox, as she shrunk away from the crowd, watching Bolt cause a scene.

After a long while, I tugged Alan’s sleeve, motioning to the path back up the cliffs to the car. The fresh air had done us good, as had dog-time. Studies abound with the stress-relieving benefits of being around dogs, and so with lower blood pressure, in a better mood, and feeling a whole lot less lonely, we set off. I like dogs an inch more after my gorgeous Sunday on their beach with them, which many dog lovers would say was worth the exercise itself. What I think is more convincing of the benefits, is the voice in the back of my head telling me that next time we return we’ll have to bring our own, to prevent that feeling of a paedophile pacing the linked fence of a grade school baseball game.