E9: About the walk and the leash
Listen to episode 9. Available wherever you listen to your podcasts.
In this episode of the Pawplexity Pawdcast, we look at what we are actually doing when we take our dogs for a walk, and what the leash has to do with it.
We think of the walk as something we provide. We choose the route, we hold the lead, we decide when to stop and when to move on. What the conversation kept returning to, across three different dogs in three different cities is that the communication had already started before any of those decisions: in the harness reached for by the door, the pace set from the first step, the tension or looseness carried in the arms once outside. The leash does not have to be taut to be transmitting.
Bruce knows that when he is rushed in the morning, Judge walks faster without being asked. Makenzie's lead stays slack, following wherever she goes, because the moment it pulls, something travels down the line that was not meant to be sent. Ben walks Bowie off-leash through forest near home for most walks, collar only for the shorter trips, and the collar never pulls because Bowie never pulls. Three different setups, and in all three the equipment is describing a relationship more than it is managing one.
The off-leash question is where it becomes more complicated. There is a version of off-leash that is genuinely generous: the dog ranges freely, sniffs what she wants, chooses more of what a walk can actually be. And there is a version where the lead coming off is permission to stop paying attention. Ben described Bowie spotting ducks at a pond and sprinting for them, his voice not carrying, nothing reaching Bowie until the ducks decided to leave. He knows it is a problem, and in that moment there was nothing to be done about it. The difference between those two versions of off-leash is not in the dog. It is in the person holding the lead, or not holding it.
The leash makes responsibility visible. Remove it and the responsibility is the same.
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