For some reason, the frequency of dogs peeing on the stairs has increased. In my building, anyway. Not sure about globally. This has been discussed with a few neighbors. The most compelling theory is that dogs pee when they smell another dog’s pee—the territorial thing—but we are not dog psychologists. We are laypeople. There is no way for us to know what is causing this.
Anyway, it’s always a pain when we, the laypeople, walk up and down the stairs because we have to dodge puddles and wet spots. This is happening about half the time I take the stairs. That’s a lot of pee. The stairwell reeks.
To be clear, I don’t blame the dogs for this. They don’t know any better. Their people aren’t teaching them. I recognize potty training a dog is probably hard, but I also recognize that plenty of people do it. It can be done. There are ways to get your dog to not pee on the stairs. And just because every dog is doing it doesn’t mean it’s ok.
But it gets worse.
One of those adorable fur creatures tried to pee on my head the other night.
I was coming down from the fourth floor when the third-floor door opened. Rather than go down the stairs, the dog coming out decided to sniff me. I was flattered. But when the dog laid down and kept sniffing me, I realized I needed to step over the dog because we were stuck. The dog’s person smiled and said in a cutesy voice, “she’s nervous.” I did not intend to make this lab nervous, but she looked sweet, because she was a lab, and she wasn’t harming anyone. All was well.
I proceeded down the stairs. Which, it’s important to note, do the double-back thing every floor, which means you’re always walking about ten feet below another flight of stairs. Which then means that when this dog peed on the stairs, I was ten feet directly below the stairs upon which she was peeing.
I stopped, water dropping around me. I stepped to the left to try to avoid it. The person, hearing me stop, said in the same voice as before, “Yeah, she peed,” as though peeing on or about my head deserved the same treatment as a mild sniffing. I don’t mind being sniffed—by a dog. But I don’t want anyone to pee on me. If this disqualifies me from the presidency, so be it, but here I am, not wanting piss on my head. And what I especially don’t want is piss on my head that’s unaccompanied by an “oh crap oh crap I’m so sorry did it get on you oh crap I’m so sorry bad dog can I do anything?”
Again, not the dog’s fault in my eyes. And thankfully, I eluded the pee and managed to navigate the rest of the staircase without incident. But come on. If you can’t get your dog to not pee on the stairs, take the elevator. If you can’t get your dog to not pee on the stairs or in the elevator, bring cleaning materials with you. If your dog unexpectedly pees within inches of somebody’s head, at least apologize.
Now, if you’ve been following the Dogs vs. Landlords saga, you know that a few months ago, the landlords asked residents to snitch on dogs off the leash. But this dog wasn’t misbehaving. The person was. And that person’s gotta know better. Also, if the person’s such an ass that they won’t even apologize when their dog takes aim at someone’s noggin, I don’t trust them to find another owner for the dog if the dog gets evicted, or to move out because the dog’s getting evicted. I can’t be responsible for another cute dog in a shelter Instagram.
I won’t snitch this time. I wish I’d cussed the guy out—after running away from the pee waterfall, of course. But I missed that opportunity, and now I’m left buying an umbrella.
