Running With the Brakes On

I’ve taken to jogging with Angel during our evening “walks.” It’s the only way that I can keep her motivated and moving forward lately. We’ll walk outside, and she’ll immediately lie down in the front yard. I have to pick her up to get her moving again. Then, two houses down, she’ll lie down again. So, I decided to make her run. I figured that if she’s trying to keep up with me, then she can’t lie down. That is mostly true. A couple of times, she did lie down, and she ended up getting dragged across the sidewalk on her back.

The only issue with jogging with her is that she will bite the leash. So, she’s running down the sidewalk with the leash in her mouth, intentionally going slow, so she can pull backwards. It’s like trying to run with the brakes on. Eventually, she gets tired and gives in to my tyranny.

We take a route that purposefully has a hill at the end, so it’s harder. As soon as Angel hits that hill, she increases her pace. It’s no longer me pulling her along, but her pulling me along. About four houses away from our yard, she will tear into a full-on sprint. I imagine the neighbors seeing a blur and a smaller blur as we zoom by their windows at full speed.

Since I started jogging, Troy has refused to accompany us on our outings. He has such poor stamina that he ends up needing to stop every ten feet. I get frustrated, and he doesn’t enjoy being left behind. So, he decided the best way to deal with this is not to work on improving his stamina, but to just quit.