Ventura County Star

I enjoy heading to downtown Ventura on Saturday mornings, for coffee and conversation with friends and then a trip to the farmers market. The place, however, is being overrun with dogs. Not the farmers market — wisely, no dogs are allowed there — but the city streets, sidewalks and shops themselves.

I’m a dog owner and dog lover. But I don’t want my doggie with me all the time — he’s no "comfort" to me or anyone when he’s agitated by all the street hustle and bustle and the other dogs being walked by.

And dogs in shops — even food emporiums and eateries — seem way off the charts. Shouldn’t human friends be comfort companions enough?

Well, apparently not if you remind one of them with a dog that it needs to be leashed, as required by the city code. An ex-friend screamed at me with obscenities when I told him his dog needs to be on a leash after a nasty, loud and growling altercation with another dog, leashed, thank goodness. He seemed ready to pounce — the human, I mean — and instead of raising my hackles further, I left the scene.

Dogs may represent our last hold onto something wild about ourselves, something lost and lamented. But dogs can’t be happy on a crowded sidewalk, no matter how well-trained or tamed. It seems to me a form of mild cruelty to subject them to the rigors of obedience when confronted by endless human and canine smells and sights that arouse their curiosity and put them on high alert for defense, block after block, or table after table if you’re having coffee.

Take them to the park (Arroyo Verde or Camino Real), play fetch, let them roam free for a while. That’s healthy for us and comforting for them.

Bob Chianese, Ventura