A very good article

http://notesfromadogwalker.com/2012/01/04/off-leash-dogs/

Couldn't have said it better myself, probably because every time I attempt to type something like that I have to walk away after a few minutes to keep myself from spontaneously combusting with suppressed rage.

Can you not do that, please?

There are a lot of little things people do that really bother me, but that I feel I can't mention because they sound so silly. A rather extreme example of this was a woman in one of the college classes I've taken at the local university center.
It was the first day of class and we were all choosing our seats. I went to sit in the back, which is one of the things I try to always do because it makes things easier on Poodleface. If I'm at the back of the room none of my classmates will need to walk by me, which greatly reduces the chance that Poodleface will be tripped over or stepped on, and also makes it easier for everyone in the room to ignore him.
A woman in yoga gear and with long blond hair (I never learned her name) came in and started looking around for a seat. When she saw Poodleface her eyes grew wide and she immediately sat down in the seat in front of me, turned herself backwards, and started watching my dog. I expected her to hold out her hand to him or try to whisper something, and after a minute of this I was beginning to pray she would, so that I could tell her off and get her to turn back around. But she didn't. She was just...staring. The instructor came in and introduced himself and started talking, but she didn't turn back around. She was still staring at my dog! Not moving, just staring, barely blinking, with her mouth open! I had a half-dozen snarky comments I was dying to make, but she hadn't done anything to be besides thoroughly creep me out, so I stayed silent and squirmed uncomfortably. Almost ten minutes into the class the teacher passed out a worksheet to see how much we already knew, and this seemed to break the spell. She turned around, and you could've cleared the leaves off your front lawn with my sigh of relief. But then she finished her worksheet and went back to staring at my dog.
I'd had enough, and I asked her what she was doing. She beamed at me and told me that my dog was amazingly well-behaved, and so cute, and she just loved him, but that I shouldn't worry because she wasn't going to try and touch him. All I could think of to say was, "Can you...not....please?"
She turned back around, but for the rest of the semester she'd turn around and watch my dog whenever she was bored.
Please don't stare at me, I hate it, and if you absolutely have to stare maybe you could close your mouth?!?

Applause for the pleasant security guard

On our vacation we stopped at a mall, and at that mall I bought some wonderful pants and a shirt. The pants were wonderful because they were marked as 'tall' and thus fit my legs without requiring a belt. Our unpleasant little town is too small to stock such things, but this entry really isn't about pants, so I'll get on with it now.

While at the mall I was approached by a security guard who wanted conformation that Poodleface was a service dog. He approached me with a smile and phrased his question politely. I politely responded that yes, he was a service dog, and that I had his license with me if the guard wanted to see it. He assured me that wasn't necessary and told me to have a nice day. And that was it. 

Here is a list of everything the guard did right:

• He quietly approached me instead of flagging me down and making a scene
• Instead of being confrontational he addressed me politely and used a pleasant tone
• He didn't demand to know the type of service dog, type of disability, or anything more than what he was legally allowed to ask
• He didn't attempt to touch or interact with my dog in any way
• He didn't attempt to make conversation about dogs and let me immediately return to shopping
• He treated me like a person instead of a liability to be cleared up

Never have I met a person more reasonable about service dogs than the pleasant security guard. I take my hat off to the pleasant security guard. I thoroughly applaud him, and I wish him well in all his future endeavors. This world needs more pleasant security guards. 

I'd like to speak to your manager. Unless he has the same accent.

Poodleface and I had been to Texas once before, when my mother wanted to rescue a poodle named Sage she'd found on a shelter website.
I don't think I've talked about Sage.
Sage is a former puppy mill mommy that my mother wants to train to be a therapy dog. She's a little shorter and a little heavier than Poodleface, loves people, loves to be petted, and still occasionally ducks when someone raises their arm. I once threw a dog toy over her head (Poodleface was standing behind her) and she ran out of the room. I'm not sure I've ever felt worse. I sometimes call her Soft Sage because when we got her the shelter had given her a ridiculously poofy poodle cut and you could bury your fingers in two inches of fur on her topknot without ever touching the dog.
I suppose I'll have to blog about that trip later.
Anyway, I'd already been to Texas once, and I'd already had uncomfortable encounters with people with thick accents who hadn't heard of service dogs. But the one I had on this trip was worse, for several reasons.

• It was dark out.
• No other employee with an accent I could understand overheard and rushed over to sort things out.
• My father walked in.

It was dark outside and bright inside and the gas station had large windows, which was probably pleasant during the day but at night felt very vulnerable. I went in to buy some chips while my father was putting gas in the camper.

The man behind the counter immediately stopped me and told me that I couldn't have a dog inside. I said it was a service dog, which 90% of the time makes people immediately step back and leave me alone. He shook his head and said something quickly I couldn't understand with his accent. 

I gave my little speech on how service dogs were protected by federal law. He had his arms crossed and was still shaking his head at me, occasionally talking over me to say that I should leave. I got Poodleface's license out of his vest and showed it to him. I said that Poodleface was the same as a seeing-eye dog and that, really, he couldn't throw me out. He still said no, and something about his bosses rule that I didn't really get because, again, he was talking too fast in an accent I couldn't understand. I put the license back in the jacket and got out one of my ridiculously friendly cards, folded over once and with happy rounded edges, which boldly proclaim "I'm a service dog!" and go on to list all the rules and regulations. I held it out to him. He shook his head and refused to take it. I stood there, with my back to these huge dark windows, feeling small and alone and waving this card and wondering if, maybe, I should just give up. I felt like I was in the wrong here, and I felt powerless, and he was taller than me and I couldn't understand him. 

I heard the door open behind me, and then my father was standing over my shoulder, repeating what I'd said to the man who was still shaking his head. I stood in the background and felt horrible and embarrassed while they talked, and when the man finally threw up his hands and said okay and walked away from the counter to the other end of the store, I decided that I didn't really want any chips and ran like hell back to the camper. I was so ashamed that my father had had to step in like that.

That was really horrible.

I think I'll stay out of Texas from now on.

I expand my scientific horizons, Poodleface gets stalked by a tourist

We went to a science museum while on vacation, which I initially thought was going to be a disaster but which turned out alright in the end.
My father and I bought tickets to see a show in the planetarium on the history of spaceflight, and we had a half-hour to kill in the rest of the museum before the show started. The front hall was under construction and very loud, so we escaped to a wing filled with model planets and interactive solar system displays, and I was sitting at one with Poodleface on the floor beside me when he suddenly started to growl. I turned around and shushed him and found myself face-to-face with a very embarrassed-looking woman who was, I thought, ridiculously hunched over. She straightened up and hurried away, and my dad, who had seen the whole thing, explained that she had been very slowly and deliberately creeping up on Poodleface, which he had noticed and felt threatened by since she was acting more like an incompetent predator than one of the normal curious humans he was used to dealing with.
Honestly, you can just come over and talk to me. I won't get offended. You don't need to stalk my dog.
I was feeling really embarrassed and defensive and worried that we would get thrown out because my dog had growled, but nothing happened and we got to see the show in the planetarium. And they had handicapped seating! Some theaters don't, and in those I put Poodleface on my lap and suffer through the show with fifty-two pounds of disgruntled poodle curled up on my legs, which is why I absolutely love it when I get a special seat with lots of room around it and he can just stretch out on the floor.
The show was projected onto the curved ceiling overhead, and the animation was done so that it changed perspective with each shot and made the audience feel like we were hurtling through space. Poodleface watched very intently, occasionally tilting his head or glancing at me to show just how much he didn't understand, but he was polite and well-behaved and very adorable.
After the show we looked at the dinosaur bones and walked through a mock cave and the glowing inside of a plaster volcano, and while we were in the ocean life wing and I was admiring a tank of manta rays (Poodleface didn't understand what they were and has his head sideways again) a woman came bounding over, squealed at Poodleface and held out her arms as though she wanted to hug him, then told me very seriously that I didn't have to worry; she knew all about service dogs and understood that they couldn't be petted or talked to. I wondered aloud to my dad if she thought knowing the rules made her above them when we weren't quite out of earshot, which felt good in the heat of the moment but was really pretty mean of me. Sorry about that.
We went out through the gift shop, where I discovered that astronaut ice cream is manufactured on equipment that also processes peanuts (It takes some of the novelty out of a thing when you realize it's made in a factory and not some top-secret NASA supply room, so I wasn't all that disappointed) and where my dad bought a tube with a spring in it that sounds like an alien ray gun every time it's jostled. Poodleface once again didn't understand, and this time he was a little afraid and stood behind my legs. He warmed up to the tube on the walk back to the camper, which sounded like we were being shot at every step of the way. Fortunately, no one was wearing red.

Well....shit.

I had a nice long post partway typed out about the vacation we just came back from, but my computer stalled and froze and had to be restarted and I lost the whole thing. Sooooo, I'll come back to that later and for now I'm gonna talk about sunglasses.

We went to New Mexico and Texas in our camper last week and I spent a lot of time thinking longingly of sunglasses and how much I miss being able to wear them. I'd love to, but I don't, because they're just not worth the misunderstandings.
I got Poodleface at the beginning of summer, so I learned fairly quickly that if you wear sunglasses whilst walking a service dog everyone will assume that you're blind. A lot of people will approach you and ask if they're right, are you blind? And then you get to explain that you're not, no, it's just very bright outside, and then the conversation can go one of two ways. They can be embarrassed but handle it well, or they can demand to know if you really need a service dog at all or if you were just hoping you could wear the sunglasses and have no one notice the clearly unworthy dog you've just brought into their store.
So I swore off sunglasses forever.

Funny story: I'm not really an animal abuser

There used to be a rumor at the high school that I was an animal abuser and that whenever I was alone with Poodleface I beat him. Although we communicate really well, I think there are always going to be times we don't understand each other and make some sort of mistake. While we were attending school I tripped over him once and stepped on his paw twice, and there were several times where he stepped on my foot or walked into my legs. Whenever one of those things happened everyone nearby would start shouting that I was an animal abuser. It was really very annoying; I doubt there's anyone in the world who hasn't tripped on their dog at some point.
I had the flu a few months before I left high school and on my first day back I needed to talk to my science teacher about the test I'd missed. He gave us the period to work, so I decided not to wait until after class and told Poodleface to stay beside my desk while I went up to speak with the teacher. It was something I'd done lots of times; rousing a sleeping poodle and having him walk with me just to ask a question or hand in a work sheet isn't practical, and as long as he can see me he's perfectly willing to stay.
I'd barely said two words to the teacher before I heard nails skittering on linoleum and Poodleface came hurrying up the aisle to me. He looked frightened of something, and as I picked up the leash to reassure him a boy who sits near me started stammering that he'd thought Poodleface wanted to be petted.
He'd thought, he told me as I put my dog back under my desk, that the only reason I wouldn't let anyone pet Poodleface was to me mean to him, so as soon as I left him alone he tried to comfort him because he was probably really sad if I was abusing him and he could use all the love he could get. But Poodleface freaked out because he knows I'm the only one who ever touches him in school and he could clearly see that I was nowhere near him, and when he jumped the boy tried to grab him, and it became embarrassingly clear that I wasn't an animal abuser when Poodleface ran to me for reassurance.
Not that it did anything to stop the rumor, but it's a good lesson in why service dogs shouldn't be petted. Even if you really want to.

Part of me is male with four legs, apparently

Before I got one myself, I thought of a service dog as something like a wheelchair or an artificial arm. After I got one I re-evaluated my analogy and decided that they're more like exceedingly well-behaved children who think squirrels are really interesting. I also found out that, legally, they're the same as pacemakers or insulin pumps. From the perspective of a lawyer, Poodleface is an extension of my own body, which is how they justify that I'm allowed to take him everywhere. Not because he's a very special dog, but because he's me. Only furrier. And the wrong gender.
I found that policy a bit oddly worded until I read The Golden Compass and realized that I've technically got a daemon.

What would it take to make a scaredy-cat play with fire?

In one of my previous posts I talked about how my allergist assumed that I was no longer allergic to peanuts because I hadn't been to the emergency room in the past year. I hadn't planned on talking about him any further, but today I found an appointment reminder postcard from him in my mailbox and now I'm angry enough to elaborate on his story.

As I said before, he was insistent that I, personally, didn't need a service dog, nor did anyone else with a severe allergy. He explained to my family why he thought it was a bad idea and said that we should instead consider prescription medication to suppress my immune system. My father declined the medication and insisted that he give me the test, as they had planned over the phone. He did have me tested but kept insisting that I must not be severely allergic anymore because I hadn't nearly died recently.

The tests showed that I was still severely allergic and perhaps I hadn't nearly died recently because I was a responsible young adult who knew how to manage my allergy. 

My parents sent in the paperwork for the service dog and everything was approved. Now we just had to get permission from the school district for me to bring the dog to school.

The reason my parents thought I needed a dog was that I kept getting sick in class. I would being to cough and would get painful rashes, usually on the palms of my hands or the undersides of my arms, which indicated that I'd sat at a contaminated desk or touched a contaminated hand rail. The reactions that I was having were usually very painful, and with each new reaction there was a risk that my allergy could become much more severe. It was already at the point were it could kill me, and my parents didn't want it to become bad enough that I could die before medical help could arrive. 

About three weeks after I'd seen the allergist I started to have problems in one of my classes. After a few minutes of class my hands would begin to feel hot and itchy and I would being to cough. On one day I wore short sleeves and the reaction covered my entire right arm. After a few minutes of coughing I would either ask to leave or the teacher would order me to step outside until I could get control of myself, and then I would go down to the office and get some Benadryl from the nurse and ask that someone please clean my desk. This happened three days in a row. On the third day my assigned guidance counselor approached me as I was sitting outside the nurse's office waiting for the period to end. She sat down next to me and asked me, with great concern in her voice, why I was skipping this class. I told her that I wasn't skipping, I really was having an allergic reaction. She said, still sounding very concerned, that she knew it wasn't possible for me to have an allergic reaction unless I ate something and that I could tell her what was bothering me. I tried to explain that some allergies are more severe than others, but she left before I could finish.

She went back to her office and made several phone calls, one of which was to my allergist, whose number I assume she got from my file. She told him that, hypothetically, there was a student who was claiming to have an allergic reaction to peanuts when there were no peanuts present in the room, and that she hadn't recently eaten anything that might have been causing it. And she wondered, hypothetically, if this was possible. My allergist told her that, hypothetically, the student was lying. 

Being the kind, caring, and exceedingly nosy person that she is, my counselor decided that she should save my academic future by putting a stop to my lying. 

There were already a lot of people who didn't believe me, so many that I was honestly surprised when the teacher was the one who asked me to leave. Usually I'm told that I have to stay, and then they would watch me closely to see if they could find a flaw in my acting, and I'd either have to get up and leave without their permission or bother them enough that they let me leave so that my parents wouldn't complain to the school. So the fact that my counselor had gotten a medical professional to say that, hypothetically, I was a liar, wasn't great for the case that I should be allowed to have a service dog.

That night my father spent hours at the computer, surfing the internet and printing a stack of papers as thick as a paperback book. They all talked about severe food allergies, and they all supported what I'd said. He took it to the principal, explained what was happening with me, and then made the case for the service dog. The principal agreed.

But it really screwed me up. I already wasn't sure I deserved a service dog. The junior high had let people give me death threats and acted like I was off my nut when I tried to get them to help me. My allergist had insisted a service dog was unnecessary. And half the adults in my life got angry or exasperated or began patting me on the head when I mentioned my allergies. Was I really allergic? Was I lying so well I'd convinced myself? What could I have done wrong to make so many people angry with me? 

My father cut my old allergist out of the loop. The next time we needed a doctor's note he got it from the pediatrician, and he found a new allergist out of state that I'll go to the next time I need an allergy test. So today, when I got the appointment card from that close-minded old fart, and I realized that he still considers me his patient and thinks he can have a say in my life, I took it outside and burned it. 

If you do this, I hate you

I can't stand people who make their children's happiness my responsibility. When this happens I usually just get a nasty look after I've told their little angel that they can't pet my dog, but there was one mother whom I met last May who was rude enough that I've decided to post about her.
Poodleface and I were walking through what passes for downtown in a place as small as this. We were on our way to the bookstore and were almost there when a mother down the street started excitedly telling her daughter to look at the dog. I feel a little strange whenever parents do that, but whatever. It's no big deal.
I went into the bookstore and started reading the back cover of a book on the front table, but before I'd read more than the first sentence the door opened and the mother came through leading her daughter by the hand and talking happily to her about going to see the dog. I shook my head at her and moved farther down the table, but she still came over to me and asked me brightly if her daughter could pet my dog. "No," I said, a bit weirded out that she'd followed me into the store. She stared at me like I'd done something shocking, and I put the book down and headed for the back of the store because I really hate having to justify the no petting rule to sulking mothers.
I noticed a book on the bottom shelf that looked interesting so I sat on the floor and started looking through it.  I'd been there a few minutes when I heard someone clear their throat above me and I looked up to see that the same mother had once again followed me, and she did not look happy. I started to stand up but she held up her hands and told me to stop; she didn't want me to run away again. I'd actually just wanted to be on the same level as her, but whatever. I stayed on the ground and waited as she told me how I'd made her daughter cry with my rudeness and how disappointed she was that I wasn't even willing to speak to a small child.
I waited until she was done, then got to my feet and told her that I wasn't very happy either; I didn't like being treated like a museum exhibit and if I didn't want to talk to her daughter I didn't have to.
She looked at me like she couldn't believe there were people like me in the world, then said huffily, "Well, I guess we both learned something today. And now my daughter knows not to touch strange dogs." She stormed off and I stood there wishing I wasn't a teenager so she might have taken me a little more seriously.

There ought to be a manual

If you or someone you know has a food allergy, that's okay. There are about a hundred sites that'll tell you what to do. They'll give you recipes and activities and ideas that'll work for everyone, and they'll explain in detail exactly why all of that is necessary.
If you or someone you know has a service dog, that's a bit problematic. There aren't any rules for that.

Okay, so there are a lot of different kinds of service dog and a lot of different kinds of training and no two dogs are alike, but surely we all have some things in common? Like small children. We should be told how to keep a small child from touching our service dog. Or, there could be a chapter on restaurants. Restaurants are fraught with peril for service dog owners. Table or booth, which has more room for a dog? Do you let your dog eat the food on the floor or does that look unprofessional? Should you wait in an awkward silence while the waitstaff coos over your dog or is it okay to ask them to knock it off and pay attention to their customer? What if someone at a table near you starts complaining about unsanitary dogs? Do you ignore them or defend yourself? And what if there's a hyperactive child?
Or, there could be a list of tactics for diffusing a situation where someone won't let you in because they don't know about service dog laws. That's always a horrible situation and I'd love some tips on how to get through it.
There could be a chapter on traveling! It could give advice about flying with a service dog, and about hotels, and playing tourist. It could help you plan for your dog's needs, like how to get dog food through airport security or keeping your dog calm on a long bus ride.
Seriously, why isn't there a manual? I know I could have used one. For about a month after I got Poodleface I was playing it by ear and desperately trying to remember the few days of instruction I'd had from his trainer. A manual would have been a wonderful lifeline.

I'm dreaming of a white poodle

As previously mentioned, I pretty much live in the middle of nowhere and so have only crossed paths with three other people who have service dogs. One man I passed on the sidewalk. From the design of his dog's harness I guessed that he was blind, and because I was too shy to say anything to him (and, really, what would I say? "Hi there, I've also got a service dog! We should be friends!"?) he probably doesn't know I exist.
The second woman I met outside my friend's apartment when her dog ran up to me and began to bark at Poodleface before I could get inside. She caught the dog and clipped it back onto her leash and told me she was  sorry, her dog is usually a lot better behaved and it's actually a registered seizure alert dog but it knows it's not on duty now. I pointed out Poodleface's jacket and we had about a minute of service dog-related conversation before I had to go up and meet my friend. Since then I've seen her from a distance going into a store my father and I were driving past, but we haven't had another chance to talk.
The third woman I met in the candy aisle of WalGreens, and she and her psychotic dog nearly got Poodleface and I thrown out of the store. I was sitting on the floor, minding my own business and reading the ingredients list of a new kind of candy I wanted to try, when I heard growling. I looked up and saw that Poodleface was shifting from foot to foot, looking uncertain but remaining polite as a brown dog in a bright orange vest growled nastily at him. On the other end of the leash was an older woman in a flowery dress, who strangely didn't seem to care that her dog was opening both of us to possible legal action. The general public doesn't actually like it when service dogs threaten to brawl in aisle five, you see.
I dropped the candy and got to my feet, positioning the leash in my hands so that I was ensured complete control over my dog, although at the moment he wasn't actually doing anything besides shuffling and making uncertain little woofs. I asked the woman if we should maybe go to different aisles, and she smiled at me and said, "They need to learn."
Yeah, that's great, lady, your dog definitely needs to learn, so maybe you should, I dunno, teach it something? She had it on an extendable leash and was letting it have as much slack as it wanted, hadn't positioned her arm so that she would be able to pull against it if it decided to lunge, and it wasn't even wearing any kind of prong or choke collar. Not that a service dog should need one for everyday use, but they're good insurance in case something unexpected happens, like if someone decides they want to lure your dog over with a steak, or if you're face-to-face with a very irresponsible service dog owner who may or may not be about to let her dog attack your dog. Especially if you're a teenage girl and said dog is half your body weight. You can see how they would come in handy.
I started to back away, and the dog picked that moment to lunge. Poodleface started to jump toward it, and I can't really blame him; it was clearly challenging him, but, since he was wearing his prong collar (hint hint) as soon as I started moving backwards he gave up and came with me. We got to the end of the aisle, at which point the manager came hurrying over and told me to take my dog outside. I showed him Poodleface's service dog license and explained that my dog hadn't been the aggressor. He seemed a little upset about that, but he couldn't legally make either of us leave the store, so he just ordered me to stay away from the old lady, which I did, but whenever her dog caught a glimpse of me on the other end of an aisle it would start to growl again. She never seemed bothered by it and just kept smiling, so I left the store as quickly as I could and never got a chance to really talk to her.
In short, I don't know anyone else with a service dog with whom I can sit down and chat. If I thought there were enough people I'd probably try to start a support group, but this town is so small that, given two to three hours and some cool weather, I can actually walk from one end to the other. So I don't have anyone I can talk things over with and I have no idea if my experiences are common or unique, but I'm curious and I'd like to know. The thing I'd most like to talk about is my dreams.
Poodleface shows up in my dreams.
For almost two years after I got him I'd go to sleep and forget he existed, but one night, when I believe I was dreaming about jogging across a wavering foot bridge that sank abruptly into the water and necessitated me to jump, there he was beside me. A joyous white poodle leaping into the air, connected to me by our familiar leash; exactly six feet of leather that used to be red but has been worn to a supple dark brown by almost constant use.
The next night I was wandering around a beautiful museum that seemed to be part construction zone, and as I was crawling beneath scaffolding and lying on my back on a mosaic marble floor to see the paintings on the domed ceiling, Poodleface was right there beside me. I remember, I even decided to take the stairs rather than climb out a window and down a ladder because I knew he wouldn't be able to follow me.
For the past year he's been in almost all my dreams. He came with me up the stairs of the bus when the police chased and arrested me in the middle of the desert, I threw his leash away so that he wouldn't fall with me when I lost my footing on a narrow bridge, and I took him out into the river in a canoe, and then under the surface of the dark water and into a secret passage to explore with me. I've had dreams where he guided me, dreams where I lost him and panicked, dreams where he could speak and where I could send him on errands. He died once in my dreams, drowning in a swimming pool when I selfishly left him alone, and I cried myself awake and then called him over so I could hug him.
He twitches in his sleep and whimpers and snuffles, and I wonder if I'm in his dreams as often as he's in mine.
I have no idea if anyone else dreams about their service dog, and I'm really curious but have no idea who to ask. It's not like there's a manual for this kind of thing. (Which, come to think of it, there really should be. )
Maybe someone who's reading this could tell me?

Death threats

When I was in junior high I did something that irritated another girl. I'm not sure what. I just remember that one day she tapped me on the shoulder, and when I turned to her she smiled at me and told me that she was going to take a peanut and kill me.
I slapped her. I was so angry I could barely think. Not about what she'd said, but the look on her face when she'd said it. Positively gleeful.
I went to the office and said that I wanted to speak to the principal because someone had given me a death threat. He was very serious about it, very official, until I mentioned that it wasn't a knife or a gun she'd threatened me with, but a peanut. Then he relaxed. He told me that she had only been teasing me, and talked over my protests to say that kids will be kids, everyone is bullied in school. Then he told me that he could suspend me for hitting her, and if anyone was ever being mean to me again I shouldn't fight back, because if I fought back we would both have to be punished.
The next day she found me again and re-told her story, expanding the plot a little to include her going to my house and killing my pets and smearing their bodies with peanut butter so I couldn't bury them, and then killing me slowly in the empty house when I came home and was crying.
This time I didn't hit her. I didn't touch her. I didn't even insult her. I just went back to the principal, who reminded me that this happens to every kid before sending me back out of his office.
And then she would not leave me alone.
And I completely believed her. I believed that if she ever got an opportunity, if we were ever alone together, she would kill me. She looked happiest when she was imaging scenarios of my death.
And she wouldn't stop touching me. She sat behind me in third period, and she loved to brush her hands along the back of my neck and whisper threats in my ear. I hated being touched. I knew that someone's breakfast, or their hand lotion, or their pet cat could make me sick if they touched me. But my teachers told me to just ignore her, and my principal ordered me to stop using reporting her as an excuse to get out of class.
And she laughed at me. She looked so happy. I wanted to attack her and scratch her face off with my nails, but I'd been told that I would be suspended if I hurt her.
I didn't want to go anywhere alone. If I met her alone, off school grounds, I knew she'd try to kill me. But as long as I was only seeing her in the classroom she would never have a chance, and all she'd be able to do to me was imagine in my ear.
And she had friends. After a few weeks there were others who realized that no one would stop them if they wanted to threaten me. People passed me notes with threats on them, and they shouldered past me in the hall, shouting "PEANUT!" as they went. I took the notes to the office, but by now I'd so annoyed the principal that the secretaries threw me out as soon as I walked in the door. My English teacher was the only one who took the notes seriously, and she called their parents herself instead of trying to go through the principal.
I started getting sick much more often than before. My teachers got mad at me, said this was just my latest excuse to get out of class. I'd always gotten skin rashes, always felt a little off, but now it was like I was always prickly, always gray, always on the edge of sick. I wanted to tear the skin off my fingers or slam my hands in a door, do something to them because they always hurt now.
I started wearing long sleeves, and I pulled them over my hands before I touched anything. It made me feel better.
And I got used to death threats. I learned to recognize the voice of boredom and the voice of hatred and know which threats I should fear. And I learned to pretend I felt fine, and to quickly get out of the way of someone who wanted to touch me.
And sometime in eighth grade, they stopped caring. I got boring. And the girl who I'd been so sure would kill me seemed to hit some kind of anger wall, and she lashed out at everyone, and now she was the one being bullied.
But I spent a year afraid for my life, and none of my teachers cared. I told my parents a few times, when it got bad, when I was really angry, and they called the school and my teachers brushed them off and didn't actually do anything, and it upset them so much I just stopped bringing it up.
And people still threatened me, every now and then, when they felt like it.
I guess that's why they thought it would be okay to hurt my service dog.
That's why I left, you know. Someone kicked my service dog. And my teachers didn't see anything wrong with it.
So now I have a blog.
What else am I supposed to do?

Things I didn't realize

A lot of things changed for me when I got Poodleface. Some of them I was anticipating, but some surprised me. Things like:

• Constantly having my hands full. I loop Poodleface's leash around my right thumb and hold any slack leash in my right hand. I slide my left hand along the leash to let out or take back leash, depending on the size of the crowd we're in and any obstacles we might need to navigate around. This means that I can't carry many things, have to transfer the leash to my left hand before I can shake hands, and have to use a cart or a basket when I'm shopping for more than one item at a time. 
• Hearing people gossip about me when I'm right there. It's apparently socially acceptable to point out someone with a service dog and debate with your friend what might be wrong with them. It's apparently not socially acceptable to turn to people who are gossiping about you, smile exaggeratedly, and explain all the things they were wondering in an overly sugary voice. Which I don't think is very fair.
• Having to deal with someone else's switch from anger to deep embarrassment without making them feel worse. Some people politely take me aside and ask for confirmation that my dog is a service dog, but others feel the need to shout from across the store that I'd better take my dog outside this instant. Then they inevitably feel like dicks when they figure out it's a service dog, and I feel like I have to console the person who was just ranting at me. It's uncomfortable for both of us. 
• Having to wonder if that compliment was meant for me or for my dog. A cashier once said, "You look beautiful!" to which I responded, "Thanks." Then she turned three shades of red and confided that she'd actually been speaking to my dog. And at a school competition I once incurred the wrath of a judge by expressing annoyance that she jumped up to greet and talk to the dog of the contestant she was supposed to be judging before paying any attention to me. My supervising teacher later showed me the long, angry note she'd left on my score card about how I was far too rude and sensitive about my dog and should really learn some self-control. Excuse me for wanting to be spoken to before my four-legged companion who doesn't understand you and can't answer.
• Never, ever being alone. Poodleface sleeps in my room and comes with me whenever I leave the house. My only poodle-free moments are when I'm showering, and even then only when I lock the bathroom door because he's figured out how to open it. 
• Not getting sick anymore. I didn't really believe it could happen, but it did. No more painful rashes, no more coughing fits, no more sick headaches. I still sneeze far too much from my allergies to dust, pollen, and perfume, but I no longer feel horrible several times a month. And it's great.

Meet Riley! (and the trouble with being safe)

This is a news video about another girl with an allergen alert dog.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqrdtqJPBLE
In the video Riley's mother tells us that her daughter has almost died six times. Sounds impressive, doesn't it? It's the kind of statement that really drives home just how bad her allergy really is.
To qualify for an allergen alert dog I had to have a recent allergy test proving that my allergy was as bad as I said it was. So my parents drove me to a nearby city to see the only allergist in the state (we really do live in the middle of nowhere) and see if my allergy was still just as severe.
The first thing the allergist asked me was how many times I'd been to the emergency room in the last year. Rather proud of myself, I told him none. To which he smiled and reassured me that I didn't need a service dog, I clearly wasn't that allergic.
Hold on, hold it, hold the phone! I'd stayed out of the emergency room by being responsible about my allergy! I'd carried chewable Benadryl tablets everywhere and taken one whenever I was having a reaction, before it got bad. I had turned down numerous invitations to eat out. I'd packed my lunch every day for school, and I'd cleaned the table with a wet wipe before I sat down. I never, never ate anything that wasn't packaged, sealed, and with a clear list on ingredients, or that I hadn't made myself. Therefore, I hadn't had any reactions from ingesting peanuts, which are the kind most likely to be lethal in under five minutes. I'd had lots of reactions from physical contact or from the smell or from inhaling peanut dust, but they were less likely to be severe and I'd always taken medication. I thought I should be commended for my diligence, and that it was obvious I must be very allergic if I was still managing to get sick from peanuts even with all I was doing to stay safe.
The allergist wasn't the first person I'd heard this from. Adults my parents had attempted to explain me to found it hard to believe that I could be as allergic as they said I was if they didn't have at least one horror story about a doctor pulling me back from the brink.
I don't like having reactions. They hurt. A lot. I think it makes sense that I go out of my way to avoid them.
My parents convinced the allergist that I should be tested anyway, just to humor them. We didn't get the results of the test until a few days later, by phone call, when we were back home. Which is too bad, because I would have liked to watch his face when he learned that yes, I did in fact have a severe allergy, yes, it was bad enough to be lethal, and yes, I did need a service dog.
If I was diabetic or asthmatic or something I wouldn't have to tell people a near-death horror story to make them believe me. It's irritating that I need to do so for an allergy.

How I learned to respect my elders. (not really)

Most people are reasonably nice about my service dog. Some touch without asking, but since they nearly always have the decency to be embarassed when I tell them to stop it's hard to hold a grudge. However, there was one woman, who I remembered this morning on my way to the mall for some new pants, who apparently decided that acting embarassed was a stupid course of action when the whole thing was really my fault anyway, which has now earned her a post on my blog. Because I'm still pissed about it.
I live somewhere very small. Just big enough for businesses to come in and try their luck, but small enough that they're sent packing months later, completely broke. In my seventeen years I've watched five pet shops, two toy stores, one Payless, one music store, and a lot of stores I'm probably forgetting meet their doom. I spend a lot of time hoping that the book store isn't going next, and it's just passed the four year mark so I'm cautiously optimistic that it's going to be ok.
Back in January I went to the mall with a friend. We wandered around for about twenty minutes before going into the novelty shop that had arrived five months ago. We looked at some figurines and some stress balls and some large light-up plant-type things, and we were holding up some stretchy shirts and laughing about them when the one adult manning the store came up behind me and began petting my dog. I turned around and told her to stop. My next sentence was going to be about how my dog is a service dog and they can't be petted, but I only got part of it out before being severely scolded for my rudeness. Shocked, I looked up from my dog and saw that her expression suggested she was sucking on a lemon seasoned with Dramamine that had said something nasty about her mother. Surely, I thought, she was angry because my friend and I had been being loud, not because I'd told her not to pet my dog.
Nope, actually. It was the dog.
My friend stepped up beside me and told her politely that not even she could pet my dog, that was just how service dogs work. She cut her off as well to further criticize my social skills and say that the way I'd spoken to her had been horribly rude and I obviously had no respect for my elders. Beginning to panic, I stammered something about how respect didn't play into it, she just couldn't pet my service dog, it said so on his jacket. Once again, she talked over me about my rudeness, this time adding that I should be ashamed of myself. And then she threw me out of the store.
For telling her not to pet my dog, she threw me out of the store.
I was pretty sure that was illegal in some way, and tried to say so. She repeated that I was rude and that I should learn to respect my elders. Then she pointed toward the door and pursed her lemon-sucking lips even tighter. I considered asking to speak to her supervisor. I considered pulling out my cell phone and threatening to call the police and ask if she was allowed to throw me out for this. I considered behaving like the teenager I was and leaving in a storm of profanity. Not being particularly brave, the method of exit I chose was to gape at her for a few seconds, then slink out the door with my cheeks burning and blood pounding in my ears.
My friend and I found a new store to be loud in, occasionally tossing her more offensive statements back and forth and listing all the reasons she was a bitch. And then we realized something sobering. I'd left my coat in the store.
We returned to find it lying on the counter and the woman determinedly ignoring us as she fiddled with the register. Having had time to think about what I should have done, I asked to speak to her supervisor. She told me she was in charge here. I told her I was sorry if I'd offended her but service dogs just can't be petted. She told me, again, that I was rude and needed to respect my elders and threw me (and my coat) out of the store. Again.
By this time I'd overcome my initial fight-or-flight response to having and authority figure so angry at me and decided that I was no longer scared and was instead pissed as hell. I saw no disrespect in telling her she couldn't pet my dog and was unimpressed by her continual use of the "I'm your elder" card, in my opinion only slightly less irritating than the "It's because I'm black" card. My friend and I went down the the mall office intending to file a complaint, but found a sign saying that it was only staffed on the dates listed on the door, the day we were there not being one of them, and that if we wanted to report something we would need to call the listed number. So we got out my cell phone and called the listed number, got an answering machine, and discovered from the message that we needed to be able to tell them the name of the store. So my friend ran off again to find out what it was while I sat on the floor outside the empty office in the ghost town of a mall that apparently ran itself. Once we had the name we called again and left the message.
Two weeks later the store went out of business. I'm not going to pretend I was sad.

Things that make me smile

• SERVICE ANIMALS WELCOME signs. I see one of those and I know I'm going to be left alone.
• Mothers who say to their children as I pass, "Oh, see, that's a service dog. Now, the thing about service dogs is that they can't be petted, they're working. They help people with special needs...." I'm instantly proud of any mother I hear say that. 
• People who approach me and say, "I have a sister who's considering getting a service dog. Can I ask you a few questions?"
• Employees who show me where to find the frozen peas without saying one word about my dog.
• People who tell off other people who attempt to pet my dog, sometimes before I've even noticed it's happening.
• Dog owners who immediately control their barking dogs so I don't have to worry about them running over and provoking Poodleface.
• Obvious dog lovers with enough self-control to admire my dog from afar.

And, finally, the thing that makes me smile the most,

• People I've known for a while who one day say to me, "Oh my gosh! For a moment there, I forgot you have a service dog" 

Things that make me wince

• Loud, smiling women who rush over to me in public and begin with a joyful, "Oh, my sister had a chihuahua with fur just that shade!", and proceed to ignore my escape tactics and lack of eye contact and regale me with little Toby's life story. (While some people with service dogs are probably dog lovers, I, personally, just want to finish my shopping.)
• Unsupervised children running nearby. They tend to gravitate toward a dog, and more than once I've accidentally made one cry by telling them not to pet it. The situation only gets worse should the absent parents pick that moment to appear. (True story; a mother once screamed at me in the middle of the produce aisle because her toddler had flung himself on the floor and was crying. He was crying because I told him not to touch my dog, and then (gently) removed his hand when he touched my dog anyway.)
• Whistling and clicking noises or other dog-calling behavior. Seriously, that's not cool. It's humiliating and irritating and very, very dangerous if they decide to do it to a more critical kind of service dog. Also, there's no way to get in the person's face about it without looking like I'm over-reacting. 
• Barking, from other dogs. My Poodleface is wonderfully behaved, but he's still a dog, and I'm uncomfortable in situations where his self-control is being tested.
• Barking, from other humans. Okay, that's just mean.
• NO DOGS ALLOWED signs. I see one of those and I know there's going to be a confrontation. I get to explain to some under-informed and probably under-paid employee how service dogs are exempt from that rule, and then I get to explain that yes, I'm allowed to have a service dog even though I'm not blind. 
• People who I swear I've never seen before who say I had a long and informative discussion about service dogs with them two months ago. Apparently I'm the only girl in town who goes everywhere with a white poodle and therefore very easy to recognize. 

Also, it's not easy to remember who you've given a speech to if you've given it about five hundred times.

• Mothers who have their babies say "doggie" as I pass.

Okay, I know I'm in the minority on that one because it's happened so many times it MUST be considered normal, but really, it bugs me. What if I was in a wheelchair? Would it still be okay to have a baby say it? 

What irritates me the most about this one is that I don't know how to get them to understand that I don't like it. I've tried just going over to them and saying "Excuse me, I find that offensive. Could you please stop?" But it doesn't work. They just look at me like I've requested something bizarre, or like I'VE said something offensive. Obvious eye rolling or annoyed body language doesn't work either, and neither does irritated sarcasm. It's a situation I don't know how to deal with, but that I'm apparently not supposed to feel I need to deal with. Am I really the only one it bugs?

And, finally, the thing that makes me wince the most,

• People who say, "But an allergy isn't a disability!