We’re having well above average temps here in Nashville again lately. It feels more like the middle of summer than early spring. Today is supposed to reach 88 degrees. (If not 90.)
On Tuesday nights I play volleyball at Centennial Park, which means Murph’s regular afternoon walks are both earlier and shorter than normal. Since it’s going to be so hot when I have to take him, and because we had company in town the last week and some of his walks were abbreviated then, and because today is May Day, I decided to spoil Murph and celebrate the day with a morning walk in the park.
We went to Crockett Park around eight a.m. It was a gorgeous morning: Bright blue sky, extremely pleasant temperatures to start with (mid to upper 60s), and just a hint of a breeze.
We hadn’t even walked 15 minutes before I could feel a change in the temperature, though. The crisp tinge to the air was quickly evaporating under the sun’s increasing strength, but the path we had chosen offered many a shady respite.
I was expecting the park to be empty. During the weekends the paths, soccer and ball fields are well utilized, but on a Tuesday morning I figured we’d have the place to ourselves. Ha! Do you know how many dogs we saw this morning? I don’t. I stopped counting after 20. I’ve never seen so many dogs there, not even on a weekend.
Normally I would say every fourth or fifth person we pass has a pooch. Today it was every fourth or fifth person who didn’t have a pooch. Murphy saw a little schnauzer we often see in the afternoons. Turns out the lucky mutt gets a morning and an afternoon walk in the park. There was a Corgi who took quite the liking to Murph, as well as a Beagle and hound, but two other black dogs whose breeds I couldn’t place barked like crazy each time we passed, much to their owner’s embarrassment. (No skin off either Murph or my noses. We don’t like everyone we meet either!)
The walk was superb until we reached the parking lot for the tennis courts. We heard a dog barking, and it sounded like it was coming from inside a parked car. Sure enough it was. In the back of an unattended SUV sat a dog in a crate. All the windows were either fully down or most of the way down, but where was the owner?
I’ll tell you: nowhere to be seen.
Why bring a dog to such a great park and leave it crated and locked in the car? A car not parked in the shade mind you.
This kind of thing upsets me more than I have words to properly convey. Yes, the morning started out pleasantly enough, but by nine it was already well above 70.
People, I don’t care who you are or how much you claim to love your dog. Even if the windows are down, don’t leave your dog in the car like that in temperatures of 70 degrees or over. (I’m being generous with that request. I actually think 65 degrees is too warm.)
Unless you want to kill your dog, that is. (The dog from this morning will hopefully be fine, but if they left him one more hour he could have suffered heatstroke –at the very least.)
Summer’s coming. In some places summer-like temperatures are already here. This is a good time to remind you all that it’s not the time of year to have your pets run errands with you.
They don’t need to be locked up in a hot car. If you have errands where you’ll be in the car with them (like going through any drive-thru services), you won’t be leaving them unattended, and the windows and/or air conditioning will still be on, fine. If not, leave them in the comfort of their home.
Please. I’m asking this for those who can’t ask it for themselves. They’ll thank you with tail wags and sloppy kisses when you return. Which is a whole heck of a lot better than coming back to a disoriented, non-responsive, or suffocated-to-death dog in your car.
(If that last sentence bothered you, good. It was meant to. Don’t be one of those indifferent types who believe something like that couldn’t possibly happen to them. Be very much aware it could!)
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