I live in a pretty residential little suburb. Not a lot of space between houses -- it's a pre-planned, post WWII neighborhood, if you will. There are also not a lot of fences. Just about everyone has a dog or two. I have two, just pups, and without a fence it's a challenge. I don't have one, and neither do many of my neighbors.

I have leashes for when my pups want to go out and play (frequently). They used to stay put in the yard until my backyard neighbors adopted their dog, a little Collie/Sheltie mix, a real sweet dog. I can't trust my puppies to stay now, because they run to my neighbors yard when he puts the dog out (no fence). So, my dogs are leashed when they are out.

My frontyard neighbor also has a Sheltie. They have a fence and so we rarely see their dog, but when we do, she’s a joy -- friendly and always ready to chase a tennis ball. My neighbors two doors down have two Shelties. These dogs are not so friendly – they are typical Shelties, constantly barking their shrill little warnings at everyone and everything. These neighbors take great pride in bragging that their little dogs never leave their unfenced yard. “It was a lot of work!” they say, over and over, “They NEVER leave our yard. We’ve trained them so well!” And since I’ve lived here, it has been true. As annoying as the little dogs are yapping at us from their yard, they don’t leave it. They run up and down the border of the yard as if there were an electric fence (there isn’t) yapping frantically at us when we walk by. “Hello ladies,” I say to the Shelties, “You are such good little girls.” (All the while I’m thinking I am so glad I live TWO houses down).

“Yes,” says the woman. “They are SO good. They NEVER leave our yard!” I know she is hinting that my dogs do leave my yard. Once a week or every other week, my pups will get loose – always because they see the Shelties out and the Shelties are frantically yapping at my dogs from the edge of their yard. So my pups take off for their yard to try and play with them, but the Shelties always snap and yap and run back inside. Teases! Anyway, my neighbor, the man, will sigh and look down his nose at me and say once again how happy he is that his little dogs are trained, and how much work it was to do so! I have no idea how they trained their dogs and frankly couldn’t care less, but it’s obviously a very big pride thing with them, so I smile and nod as I breathlessly try to round up my two puppies from his yard while they run away from me with reckless glee.

Well, a few weeks ago, I noticed that the two little Shelties were in the woods behind my house. I really didn’t care, even though they tormented my two pups on their leashes. You could practically hear them taunting, “We’re loose, and you’re not, ha ha! Our people think we are in the back yard, ha ha!” Then the other day at about 6 AM, I noticed the bolder dog, the little brown Sheltie, actually in my yard, playing with my dogs’ toys. When she saw me, she started barking fanatically as if I were intruding on to her property. The nerve! I stepped out to the yard and told her, “Oooooh, you are a naughty doggie, if your daddy sees you, you are in big trouble!” She snapped and yapped over her shoulder at me as she scooted back through the woods on her way back home.

Now, really, I do not care that his dog is sneaking into my yard. Dogs will be dogs, and in my neighborhood, one really must learn tolerance for one’s neighbors’ dogs. But I was smug with myself that this guy is soooo snotty about his dogs being so perfect, and when he’s inside enjoying his designer coffee at 6AM his dog is sneaking over the border, ha ha!

I wasn’t planning on ever saying anything to him. Let him find out on his own, I say. A small part of me admittedly was hoping the little dog would make a habit out of it, and maybe even wander into other neighbors’ yards, so it could be a neighborhood private joke on the snobby couple.

Alas, the secret was spilled last night. As we were coming home from taking our pups to the dog park, our puppies heard the little duo over in their yard barking and took off from my station wagon before I could get their leashes on. Straight over to Mr & Mrs Snob’s yard! It was complete chaos – my bigger dog was barking in his huge voice, my littler dog was zipping back and forth in the guy’s huge lawn teasing his Shelties and threatening a poop on his lawn… I was dying of embarrassment. The man haughtily called his two dogs in and watched me while I tried rounding up my two from their shenanigans. He would occasionally try and command my dogs to come in a loud, authoritative voice, and give me a knowing look when they ignored him, as if they weren’t listening to him because I hadn’t trained them well enough. (They are puppies, for Christ’s sake!).

I finally caught them and things were calming down. I started walking back toward my house, I had the bigger dog, and my 7 year old with the smaller one. The man made one more comment about how he sure is glad his dogs listen well, and NEVER LEAVE HIS YARD.

My son, with all his young angel innocence, looked up at the man with big wide eyes and said, “I think we have to tell you something, sir… Did you know that your dog comes into our yard all the time?”

The guy blustered and practically choked on his words to spit out, “NO THEY DON’T!!”

I calmly said, cough, cough, ummm, yes she does, the little brown one.

“NO, it must be one of the other Shelties on the street, my dogs would NEVER! They only go into the woods behind my house….” He trailed off as he realized the woods was a direct path to my yard, that the other dogs are either fenced or leashed, and it was indeed his dog. He turned red as a beet and started stammering something about it must be his wife’s fault.

I gave him a raised eyebrow for that comment, and told him not to worry about it. He continued to stammer and bluster and I just winked.

I squeezed my little boy's hand and we walked home. I leaned over and whispered, “Touche’!” My boy looked at me quizzically but didn't ask. I think he knew he'd trumped the guy.

Ha!

I think we're all snobs.

Awesome! :) We had a tenant a few years ago who had the sweetest black lab pup. The guy across the street complained to my wife saying: "all that dog does is bark all day long when you're gone". Threatened to call the police. The pup was safely tied to one of those screw-in-the-ground things. So the next day I came home and quietly watched the dog from our porch for about 20 minutes. She never made a peep. She was just quietly pawing at a stick in the dirt. The guy never said anything more, at least to me. But I was so pissed I wanted to take my son's sampler and play a repeating dog bark track through my guitar amp for him.
All I can think of is once there was a time when everyone around here had horses, cows and roosters. What would today's spoiled neighbors say about that?

My 6-pound pomeranian REFUSES to walk on a leash but loves to run around the backyard and do his business there. It's fenced on three sides. It works great until someone walks by with a dog on a leash. If my boy see this, he runs right up the driveway after them, barking his little heart out. My boy can't be trained either. We went to doggy training school, he flunked. He even got kicked out of doggy day care before he was even officially enrolled - he nipped at the owner. I guess there are some dogs that just can't be trained. And then there are the dogs who have their owners very well trained.

My pups are works in progress. They are pretty well trained for 5 and 6 months old, considering they would rather listen to each other than me - typical puppy behavior - they're doing wonderfully. I've never had a trash can overturned, piece of furtniture chewed or any of those horror stories. They're housetrained (my Shepherd actually rings a bell hung on my doorknob when he wants out) and can sit, stay (for about 7 seconds) and lay down.

But pups are pups, and they do ignore my commands in lieu of the chance to play with another dog.

Anyway, I think for the most, my neighbors are all fantastically tolerant of each other's dogs - perhaps because we all have 'em.

PS I'm sure that the couple I write about isn't really "snobby" per se -- at least in matters *other* than their perfect dogs... :)

Hurray for triumps, no matter how small! : )

(Damn, I wish we could post images in our comments - I have the cutest little emoticon that would've been perfect... check it out here...)

Adorable emoticon!

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