A WOMAN SCORNED

     A lady who seemed to recognize me asked about my Lake Alma training runs and without too much thought, I gave her a brief history of my trouble with the state employees regarding my dog.
     After seven months of training her to run with me through the lake grounds, with emphasis on her using the other side of the guard rail at the lake dam road, I was run down and arrested for having her off leash.  There wasn't a day I wasn't observed with my dog by one or more Lake Alma State employees and there was never a mention of a "leash law."  Of course, now, this is ancient history because the Ranger, Deputy Ranger, Ranger trainees, cruiser, 4X pickup, boat and trailer are gone due to budget cuts.
     Anyway, I had to go to court and was fined.
     "...from that time on, that little fat bitch out there is constantly harassing me about my dog..."
     The lady I'd been talking too, just before a foot race, a state employee I'd spoken to, once, and forgotten, was a co-worker of  the little fat bitch.
       Since then, I've been marked.  My dog hates the leash at the lake.  She pulls me through it, so she can be unhooked again.  It was uncanny the number of times my dog and I would be the only citizens, and a state truck would be circling.  Paranoid?  Absolutely.  Especially, those days when I'd do the entire lake run with the dog off leash.
      One winter day, I walked my dog to the frozen lake and crossed it to the island.  While we were tramping around in the snow, lfb circled the lake six times, waiting for us to come down.  I hooked up the dog and walked back across the lake.  You know she was out of her parked vehicle and approaching me to put me dog on the leash.  Even though she was, I still had to be reminded that dog wasn't "on the leash, before."  Since we were the only people on the grounds, and the exit wasn't far away, I began a tirade about what her job description was and did it include picking individuals to torment.  All the while, I was backing away to leave.
     There's a bridge from the dam/highway to the lake island.  I used to unhook my dog for that part of the run and let her swim off the island.  The state put a dog park area at one end of the lake with a list of qualifications that few dogs in the county could pass.  lfb was waiting at the end of the bridge with a warning for me and my dog.
     All local highway traffic was detoured across the dam and through the lake area.  There is room for two vehicles, but two semis are squeezing it.  My dog refused to go that way, so I unhooked her to run on the other side of the guard rail.  The fourth vehicle we met was lfb.  She mailed me a summons to court.  This resulted in my second leash law fine.
     It's been so many years since I surely hooked her up as soon as we reached the lake limits that my dog is too old to run with me anymore.
      But dig this, the route I've run around the lake and across the bridge and around the island, for decades, the run I named the "donut" because of the island "donut hole" cutout, is closed.
     The bridge is wood over steel girders.  The I-beams that support it are rusted, but the weight on it is  perhaps five people at a time, fishing.  I'd guess eighty percent of the people who fish at Lake Alma, fish off the bridge.  I'm there every other day, all year long.
    At first, there were wood planks across the entrance with warning signs.  Of course, I straddled over them and ran the island.  That was paranoia like none I ever experienced with the dog.  Within weeks, there was a seven-feet high fence walled over the planks.
     Can you even guess what individual suggested condemning the bridge?  lfb.  Even got a state senator involved.  I'll bet they agreed to allow the beaver and muskrat trappers to cross it. 
     I do two turns around the lake, now, every other day.  Been months since I've seen lfb.  Just as well, only thing left is for her to run over me.
     Ranger Rick did tell me, years after the fact, that the original arrest wasn't personal, someone complained.