One hour ago, I was ready to kick an aggressive dog that looked like Stripe from Gremlins and beat an old, entitled A-Hole of a man with my fists.  And I was having such a good day…

I woke up.  The LA sky was a little overcast.  After a quick coffee, I headed out with my two adorable Sheepadoodles, Rosie and Ernie.  They are as sweet as they are cute and very active so every morning, we take a least a 30-minute walk.  But I was having a good day.  We got a new expensive coffee and espresso maker combo machine (lattes at home? Dream come true!) that makes my Dunkin Donuts beans taste like restaurant quality.  I’m learning; it’s all about the brew.  The house was nice and clean after Mike and I did a tidy up the day before and we had been talking about our next vacation.  Costa Rica maybe?  It was an excellent start to what I thought would be an excellent day.   I was in such a good mood that we weren’t just gonna do a 30-minute walk.  No no, today would be a 60-minute walk.  Today, we would go to the park!

 On days when I have the time, I take them to our local park which is quite large.  It’s got a bandshell for concerts, public restrooms and a kid’s fancy playground… you know, the kind with a bouncy vinyl flooring in case you fall?  I grew up with wooden jungle gyms that gave you splinters and metal slides that got so blazing hot in the sun they gave you near first degree burns on your butt even through your jeans.  But hey, it built character.  There are lots of squirrels that taunt us with their tails and chirps.  And usually, there are friendly dogs with friendly butts to sniff. 

 We got there as my phone turned on my playlist of Furniture Music.  What the heck is furniture music?  Let me tell you.  Here’s a definition:

Furniture music (musique d’ameublement) is a style of minimalist, background music coined by French composer Erik Satie in 1917, designed to be ignorable and blend into the environment like furniture. It aimed to create atmosphere without demanding attention, often using short, repetitive musical phrases played live to create ambiance rather than a focused performance.

 If you haven’t heard furniture music, you should.  So, I was strolling along on my own personal yellow brick road, emanating gratitude and love when I halted in my tracks.  My body came out of its parasympathetic state before I consciously knew why.  

There he stood on the path in front.  My yellow brick road melted away, morphed by a demon dog.  It was him.  STRIPE.  That little fucker that tried to attack my happy fluffy doodles months ago.  His name is not Stripe.  We will call him Stripe because if there was ever a canine that resembled Stripe from the movie Gremlins, it’s this little bastard.  He has similar spots like Stripe.  He has two different colored beady little eyes like Stripe and he even has the signature white mohawk stripe of fur down his head. Oh, and he is pure evil. 

Now, I must tell you that I LOVE dogs.  Like insanely LOVVVVVVVE dogs.  I speak WOOF.  I love dogs more than people.  I have been around them all my life as my grandmother was breeding designer mutts before it was cool (Westies with Maltese.  Really cute).  However, I do not love aggressive off leash dogs that threaten me, my dogs or anyone minding their own damn business on a glorious day. 

I stopped and so did my beautiful morning.  And in real time I became aware of how my body shifted from calm and content into fight or flight, as Stripe slithered towards us.  Off leash.  Slowly but intentionally, like an alligator with fur.

“Can you get your dog on a leash?”  I yelled to the A-Hole owner I have encountered before.  My heart started pounding faster.  Six months ago, in practically the same spot as today, Stripe was off leash and got aggressive with my dogs.  He raced after them with teeth bared and growling as A-Hole brushed it off while sitting on a nearby bench.  Like I was some demanding Karen because I didn’t want my dogs to get bitten.  It was an attack.  No physical damage was done but it was scary.  My dogs have been bitten before, and I hope never to go through that again.   A-Hole was clearly an irresponsible and entitled jerk off who thought his Gremlin deserved to roam where he pleased. 

A-Hole softly apologized (shocking!) and called to Stripe to come, who, as Gremlins do, didn’t listen.  He continued to advance as I put my dogs behind me, getting ready to kick Stripe in the face.

 A-Hole called to him again.  Stripe ignored it again.  And my body got ready to defend itself and my dogs:  anger rising, heart beating faster and fists clenched.

 I stood my ground.  I was getting angrier by the second but my head was clear.  If I turned to run, Stripe would probably follow.  Now I began to get enraged and started yelling that his dog had done this before, get him on leash!

A-Hole apologized one more time but I realized he was useless and addressed

the advancing Gremlin directly.  This technique had worked for me before with other dogs so I gave it a go.

            “NO!  GET BACK!”, I bellowed right at Stripe.  He paused.  He seemed confused at getting some modicum of behavioral correction.  And then kept moving forward.  My heart was pounding so hard I could feel its beat in my ears.  My fists were clenched and I could feel the powerful adrenaline in my blood.  My sympathetic nervous system was in full activation and energy had been released for defense. 

            “STOP!!! GET BACK!! NO!!” Stripe paused again, long enough for A-Hole to reach him and slip some sort of cheap homemade slip rope around his neck, at which point A-Hole decided to now take the reins of attack.

            “You don’t need to come around him, you know,” he yelled.

            “Your dog is off leash and has attacked my dogs before! He is dangerous and he needs to be on a friggin’ leash.  This isn’t your park, old man!”

I was furious.  The previous threat was over but here was a tasty new one!  I was now being blamed for his dog nearly attacking mine.  I wanted to punch him in the face and kick him in the dink.  This was unacceptable.   

I turned on my heels and went back in the direction I had come, throwing some native New Yorker F*** Yous over my shoulder for good measure. 

I had to get the hell away from him.  I wanted to fight but I chose flee.

The Cortisol comedown (i.e.. resetting my nervous system back to parasympathetic state i.e. rest and digest) would take some time.  Running to get rid of that newly released energy would have been a great choice to speed up that process but anytime I run with my dogs, they win the race with their four legs and I wind up on the pavement so angry walking around the park it was!

After a few moments, and some more creative curse words muttered under my breath, I was able to view this through a scientific lens. 

Despite the facts that:

1) I was hopped up on cortisol and righteousness

2) this was totally avoidable had he been a responsible dog owner and a respectful member of the community

3) he totally deserved a round house kick to the head ,

I had protected myself and my loved ones (in this case my loved dogs).  Even though I was still enraged, I was able to recognize in real time how my nervous system had saved me.   

I focus a lot on calming and resetting my nervous system on a daily basis.  Rarely do I celebrate the fact that it really does it job!

The nervous system’s job is to keep us alive from threats: real, projected or even imagined.  I often feel nervous system dysregulation, meaning I carry trauma, PTSD and past experience into my present which effects how I experience life.  On this particular day, my nervous system did a perfect job of keeping me and my dogs safe from a gremlin and his evil keeper. 

The takeaway from this day is this:  sometimes our reaction is not an “over” reaction but an appropriate response to an actual threat.  It took me some time and effort to move past my justified rage that day.  I moved my body to use up the energy that had been released.  I reassured myself that I did a great job for protecting my beloved dogs.  And I wrote this blog to learn from it and to try and find some humor in the situation.  These are a few of the many tools that I use myself and teach others on how to regulate their nervous system.

I’ve heard from the great Dr. Joe Dispenza whose work I follow and admire very much, that memory without emotion is called wisdom.  Using this as a mantra, I strive to get a little wiser every day and know someday I will think back to this experience with Stripe and A-hole with forgiveness in my heart.  Someday.  Not today.  Today, just for now, I envision them at the bottom of a lake.