Not all dog parks are the same.

Well, they have some things in common. Like they are fenced. And you can let your dog loose.

They also have lots of differences. Some are big. Some are small. Some have trees. Some have grass. Some gravel. Some have water, others are BYOB. Some have separate areas for small and large dogs. Some have canvas hung for shade. Some have agility toys. Some are barren. One sits on top of a subway grate–freaks the pups out until they get used to the random swoosh from underground.

And they each have their own society.

There is one that there are never any dogs at. Seriously. Never. It’s huge. And empty. Like post-Chernobyl empty. Not much fun.

There is the dog park with a bunch of young women who pay no attention to their dogs while engrossed in their phones. They are especially not paying attention when their dogs are being aggressive. Swipe left.

There is a park where the old lady comes in with her standard poodle who is totally out of control. As she enters, there is an exodus of other dog owners because her dog has a tendency to try and bite the other dogs. She doesn’t recognize this tendency herself.

There is the park where folks are very snooty about their animals. They look down on the mutts and are disturbed by the sweet pittie mixes. They have that standoffish saluki or that jumping clicking Basenji or other rare dogs that cost many dollars. They saw these dogs in a movie or a magazine. Or they had one growing up. At this park it’s always your fault–even when nothing happened.

There is the park where the dog owners bring brownies. You come in and people smile and say, “hi,” as their dog sniffs your dogs hindquarters. Everybody knows everybody else’s dogs’ names and how old they are and which dogs are buds. The people, though, are unnamed. Nobody asks what you do for a living. Nobody. This might be the only place in Washington, D.C. that you are not asked what you do.

There aren’t always brownies, or maybe there never were brownies, but it sure feels like brownies.

[made it. day2]