22 September 2003

The French Love Dogs

Around 200 years ago, Abigail Adams, the wife of one of the first US presidents described a dinner she attended in Paris.  Benjamin Franklin arrived late with a young French woman and her small dog.  During the meal the dog raised his leg to pee on the table leg, and the woman wiped it up with her skirt.  Unfortunately cleaning up after dogs has not been passed down to other generations.

Most of the dogs I have met around town are not friendly.  That is not to say that the dogs are unfriendly.  They just don’t pay attention to humans.  They seem to be looking for other dogs.

Of course humans do that too.  On the street people are constantly calling out “bonjour” or craning their necks to see if they know the person in the shop window or the car that has just raced past.  It reminds me of being in high school in Baltimore Ohio on a Friday night cruising around looking for people we knew.

Cat has a theory that the dogs of France look like their owners.  The first time I actually thought about Cat’s theory was one morning when I was sitting at the sidewalk café drinking coffee listening to Jay read the morning news.  I was looking down at the ground when I noticed a small white bulldog with a flattened nose.  The same kind of dog was on US beer commercials a few years ago.  They called him Spud.  When I looked up I could see that the guy with this dog had the same smashed in nose.  They could have been brothers except that the human was taller and walked on two legs. 

In France dog owners don’t clean up after their dogs when they “go” on the sidewalks.  The little cobblestone street where Natalie lives is an obstacle course of dog “excrement”.  There are several men who spend their entire work life walking around Senlis with little shovels and a cart on wheels just to clean up after the mess.  In Paris they have special machines for this.

As for other critters there seem to be lot more dogs then cats.  I do occasionally see cats sitting on windowsills longingly looking out the window.  Once in awhile I see people walking their cats by carrying them wrapped around their necks like cat fur collars.  The cat looks quite content.  Our cats would be insulted to be carried around like that.

This week we promised to take care of Bugsy (a British dog) overnight while his owner, Jennifer went back to England for a quick business trip.  He looks like a dingo with speckled brown course hair and gray around his mouth (he is 9 years old).  His ears stand straight up when he is listening for someone to come down the stairs.  

Lucy and Christopher Cat were not too happy about this new critter at first, but now that they can see that he has great respect for cats they are mostly ignoring him.  The fact that he can roll over on command or fetch the ball does not impress them.

Our little one loves to take Bugsy for a walk.  We’ve walked him to the shoe store and then to the sidewalk restaurant for lunch.  Bugsy patiently sat by the table while we ate.  He would have been allowed into the restaurant and the grocery store but we are way too American to do that.

The thing that amazed me as we walked with Bugsy is that French people were smiling at me…well actually at Bugsy.  All this time I thought the French just walked along and never noticed dogs.  It wasn’t until I was actually the person being led by the dog that I could see a totally different reaction by French people.  Grown men have stopped me to ask to pet him.  Women who have passed me day in and day out without a single acknowledgement smiled at Bugsy.

The biggest discovery happened right on the path where I walk all of the time…a new bright green box with a little cartoon neatly hanging above it that asked people to take the little brown plastic bag in the dispenser, and use it for the dog poop.  The bag has a metal frame to hold the top open and a piece of cardboard is attached to the frame with a series of pictures showing how to collect, press it shut and then throw it away (Ramassez, Appuyez pour fermer, Jetez!).  I was really impressed, that is until I almost stepped in some dog poop while I was busy admiring the little plastic bag.  Some things never seem to change.