Story of the day...or...that time I threatened to kill a woman's dog

When I walk home from work in Cambridge, it's quite common to see people: men, women and even little kids, walking their dogs around the neighborhood. The area right around Harvard is pretty quaint- a place with tree lined, brick sidewalk laid neighborhood with houses most people would love to grow up- and in the shadow of America's "Finest Academic Institution" (the why in the world would hire me blog is in the future- for another day). It's an ares drenched in privilege. So my walk home, over the last few summers, has always been an "adventure"- last year I was pulled over by Cambridge Police, and given a ticket, for jaywalking- which I didn't even know was done...

...so i'm always, how can we say, noticed, when i walk around town. Well today, as I'm walking, I pass an older white woman, walking a beautiful Black Labrador. As she and the dog walk by me, the dog loses it's shit and starts barking at me furiously and lunging at me. The woman is apologetic, telling me she's sorry but "her dog is racist."

Dogs aren't racist. Dogs sense fear in their owners and act accordingly. The dog brain isn't sophisticated enough to be racist. Your dog is racist if and only if you, too, are a racist. 

So I decided to let her know that. I told her that dogs aren't savvy and don't have the level of intelligence to make discernments about a persons race- the dog is not proactive, but instead, reactive, to the feelings of the owner- if the owner is comfortable and happy, the dog responds that way, and when the owner if fearful, the dog reacts that way...as i'm saying this the dog is going. fucking. bonkers. barking and lunging at me, and it's obvious she's having a hard time holding the dog. Each time the dog is closer to reaching me and she seems to be trying, but not really hard to stop him. I think she'd be fine with this dog "scaring me off" and I have to get bitten, so be it.

Me: I will, if this dog attacks me, without question, snap this dogs fucking neck. I've done it before, so I have no problem doing it again...

She yanks her dog away, mumbling under her breath about me as if I couldn't hear her. Benefit of whiteness: those comments get her confronted in a way she'd be uncomfortable, but would also get me arrested. I walk home, realizing that a mere two minutes ago, I would have considered my day alright despite waking up with food poisoning. 

Yes, I have had to break a dog's neck. Yes, there were legal implications.  Yes, I was absolved of those implications. That's for another day though...