I came home from work yesterday, and my husband and son were outside with a few neighbors.  The kids were riding their bikes and the adults were hanging out nearby. My daughter and I went across the street to join them.  Our temps were back in the 60s, so it was the first day that we had been able to get outdoors in several weeks.  The kids were enjoying chasing each other with their bikes and my dog was enjoying his rub down from all the neighbors.

We spotted a car and told the kids to get out of the street.  It was our next door neighbor coming home from work.  She parked her car in front of her house and began to unload her groceries.  At the same time, there was a collision between two of the bikes and my son ended up on the ground.  As we ran to attend to him, my dog decided to cross the street and greet our neighbor.  We heard a loud scream and looked up to see him running towards her, tail wagging, eager to say hello.

She is terrified of dogs.

My husband quickly yelled for the dog and he came running back.  I admonished him and began the process of apologizing to my neighbor.  She began yelling at me from across the street.  After seeing that my son was okay, I walked over to her side of the street where she continued to yell at me.  She told me that she was scared of dogs. She told me that my dog was big.  She told me that he should be on a leash.  She expounded, letting me know that it was a law in our city that anytime a dog was outside it needed to be on a leash. She told me that if she had a relationship with the dog she would have been okay, but she didn’t know our dog.  With every statement that she made, I acknowledged it and apologized.  I told her that I was well aware of her fear of our dog and that we make a concerted effort to keep him away from her, her family and her property.  I told her that we were tending to my son who had fallen off his bike. I told her that it wouldn’t happen again.  She continued to yell, and I made one more apology and walked back to where the kids and adults stood watching our exchange.

When I got back to the other side of the street, my husband said “I’m glad that you went over there. I’m not sure what I would have said to her.”  All that I could do was apologize. It must have been genuinely terrifying to see this big dog running across the street directly to her.  When we got back into our house, though, I unloaded.  In the 5 years that they have lived next door, they have made no effort to get to know us or our dog.  I don’t even know her name. We have tried to talk to them several times, but they just answer our questions and leave. They barely return our wave when we see them.  In all the times that our dog has been outside, this has been maybe the third time that he has come up to her. He doesn’t even bark at her. He just stands there and smiles at her, tail wagging. Besides, if my dog was going to attack her (which is, honestly, a joke), he would have done it the first time that he saw her- when was she going to get over it?? Several of our friends have overcome their fear of dogs by interacting with ours. She wanted to talk to me about city ordinances?? Let’s talk about the ROOSTER that they had in their backyard for several days until it mysteriously disappeared… (no joke).  I did not deserve to be yelled at. We are adults, we could have had a normal conversation.  She could have been a little more understanding of the situation.

I was really hot.  It ruined my entire evening.   When I woke up this morning, I was still mad.  I sat down to pray and remembered sitting in the same place, 24 hours prior, and ending my prayer time with this statement, inspired by the sermon this past Sunday: God help me to show your love to those around me in my community. 

I asked God to forgive me for my bad attitude- and thanked Him for holding my tongue in that moment.  I got out a card and wrote another quick note of apology to stick in their mailbox.

Be careful what you pray for- God may actually answer it.

~Shiney