A Scary Outburst of Rage at the Dog Park

 Our early morning walk at the 17th St dog park  ( these days at 7:00 a.m. ) has its own set of rituals and customs: unwritten, soon learned, and mostly respected.  

0ur dogs are those whose walkers/owners have schooled them into good behaviour.  Most dogs are anxious to learn.

For the most part our owners are amiable and chatty (NO POLITICS) .  We have reasonable interests in each other's lives  (with a few * nosy parkers).

Any pretense that this Dog Park is Sarasota's Elysian field was blown to smithereens yesterday morning, as most owners and dogs were ambling in the direction of the exit.

One unleashed Puppy bit an Old Boy Alaskan type dog.  

Cooper and I didn't see it but we turned when we heard the yelp.

We heard other noises.  The two owners engaged in a fierce and loud argument.  One owner was vociferous and mostly calm.  The other owner "lost it".

He yelled.   He uttered a sentence sentence in which the preposition; the subject; the verbs and the adverbs; a few adjectives; and the object were each the same word.   

It was the f word; repeated like a mantra. I shielded Cooper's ears.

The possibility of violence was always present, so no person sought to interfere.  With others I allowed the owner with the naughty  puppy to make his way to the exit with respectful semi silence.

 A group surrounded the belligerent owner; perhaps to counsel, maybe to sympathise.

I drove away with a few grams of empathy. I've been known to blow my top.  I try to keep an injunction from the Psalms in mind-  

"Refrain from anger, leave rage alone."  Psalm 37:8

The Park is closed on Tuesday mornings.  May that break will allow the antagonists  time to.............?