[nagdu] To use or not to use the dog in certain situations

[Robert Hooper]

Hello lists:

This message isn't about whether to leave the dog home in certain situations, but rather it is appropriate to forego the use of a dog when in certain situations?
For example, I have been in a few situations where I have preferred to hitchhike on somebody's elbow while healing Bailey beside me. In these situations, he is still wearing a harness, and all the harness rules still apply. When doing this, I will sometimes get questions or comments. These are typically questions or comments that portray the person's belief (or quandary, if a question) that because I have a Seeing Eye dog, I should use it (I.E. by picking up the harness) 100% of the time. However, I do not believe that this is always ideal. My reasons for believing such follow-these are also the reasons I give to these people (who are most often family members or friends-I have little patience for John Q. Public and his occasional ignorance about service animals).
I may offend some staunch individualists and some hard core believers in the "level playing field" with this scenario, but bear with me. I believe that shopping as an individual with a visual impairment next to impossible-that is, if you go alone and request no help from the store's customer service. Although I can and have memorized store sections (the different areas of a grocery store, for example), it would be vastly inefficient and morbidly time consuming to attempt to identify every single thing on every shelf of a store. Granted, some items can be determined by touch, but many items (especially those in grocery stores) are in indistinguishable boxes, cans, or some other uniformly-designed containment vessel. Some may say "yes, but there are apps that allow one to take pictures of items and have somebody identify them for you". Assuming of course that your phone is having a good connection that day, this doesn't eliminate the time consuming factor or take into account the number of retakes that might be necessary to (1) get the item in focus or (2) find the label of the item. Anyway, I am getting off track-back to my original topic. Because it is, at the very least, gruelingly tedious to shop on one's own (if one is blind), I find it necessary to shop either with someone else or using a customer service representative. Now, if one is in a Wal-Mart or another department store, a place too large to be exquisitely mapped even by those who possess the required sight to do such, there is often a lot of back tracking, U-turns, and other sudden changes of direction while a person tries to find the item for which they are looking. One advantage of a dog team (and most other mobility aids) is that a person travels best when they have a definite destination and a definite set of instructions to give their dog. Constant re-routing and back tracking serves to confuse the dog and make working it more inconvenient than not. So, I find it easier to just grab an elbow, drop the harness, and heal the dog through these shopping trips.

Another scenario involves being in a completely new or otherwise unfamiliar environment. Again, a dog team works best when the human half actually knows what and where the hell they are going and doing. Let's say that I am giving Bailey a suggested left turn because somebody with whom I am walking has told me to take the next sidewalk on the left. It is most likely that Bailey would take the suggested left. However, let's say that ten feet further along is a wider sidewalk that isn't so overgrown. Bailey, trying to be safety and work-minded (oh wonderful shepherd that he is) thinks that it is the wider sidewalk I want and thus misses the desired sidewalk entirely. He does have a tendency to do this-if there are multiple turn-offs in close proximity to one another, he will sometimes pick one that seems like it would be less challenging to navigate-and who could blame him? Would a smart puppy pick a crowded sidewalk where there are more potential obstacles and thus more opportunities to screw up and get corrected? Of course, this doesn't happen often-he will usually pick the appropriate sidewalk, probably because obstacle clearance is perhaps the thing he does best. Also, if I am merely following somebody, Bailey picks up on this as well. He is notorious for dropping many guide duties and half-assing the rest. For example, if somebody abruptly leaves the sidewalk and cuts through grass in order to take a shortcut, Bailey will go right along with them, much to his dismay (leash correction). Of course, I know to instruct people on where to stand, but it is difficult if they are not used to working with people with service animals. They may tell you to turn left as soon as you get to the sidewalk rather than 10-15 feet before, etc. In my experience, it takes a few walks before the person gets used to the timing, body positioning, etc.

I guess the thing which prompted the writing of this message was the camp at which I will be working from tomorrow until next Thursday. It is held at Wright State, a university with which I am entirely without knowledge (geographically and orientationally speaking). I will be a camp counselor and will have a sighted person helping me with the more visual aspects of my responsibilities (attendance, remote behavior, etc.). Although I could (and may eventually) teach this person how to walk with (and direct) me, we will both have the distraction of keeping track of our campers. It can be frustrating sometimes working with a dog in an unfamiliar area-the dog may be making a work-related error that goes undetected because you have no idea where you are, you, the handler, may unwittingly encourage the dog to make an error (for example, following badly worded instructions and stepping into a street, correcting the dog when you think that it went into a street because there was a ramp down and a level spot but in reality the street was about six additional feet ahead (this actually happened to me once), etc.). Also, this heightens stress levels, which get passed along to the dog, and I could go on, but I won't. So, as a result, I will probably be using a sighted guide for a while.
I don't really know what I am looking for in terms of responses from list members-so any input is welcome. I guess I am just worried that people will think "did he just get that dog for decorative purposes" and similar things. When people voice comments or questions like those I listed above, I usually ask them why they didn't ask me the same things when I had a cane. Often I would forego the use of a cane in an unfamiliar area in favor of a sighted guide for many of the same reasons that I decide to dispense with the use of a dog now. I sometimes have to remind people that a dog and a cane are analogous to two different cars-or a car and a motorcycle-they may look different, and even operate differently, but either way you still have to turn the wheel and know a way to get where you are going. In situations where one person knows the way and the other doesn't, the person who doesn't will often ride with the person who does-it saves them from the headache of trying to keep track of someone on a busy interstate and at exit ramps.
I'm just worried about leaving a negative image or impression of guide dog teams with some of the staff. And don't worry-the size of this message is in no way proportional to the amount of concern I feel-I just have a bad habit of constructing unedited novels. Either way, I will use  what I feel is the most efficient, safe, fair (to my dog) and comfortable means  of travel without compromising my dog's working ability-he will still get plenty of work, just not as much as some may think. Any thoughts, suggestions, opinions, scathing remarks, and/or sociological research papers regarding anything in this message will be received and devoured as veraciously as a lab, deprived of food for a week, would consume a cupcake smeared over a nice sirloin.
Sincerely,
Robert Hooper
Hooper.90 at buckeyemail.osu.edu
The Ohio State University, Department of Psychology; Department of Neuroscience
572 Stinchcomb Drive #3
Columbus, Ohio 43202
(740) 856-8195