I have never been bitten by a dog (by an unfriendly dog to be precise). However, there were few friendly ones who would chase me for fun. Well it was fun for them but as a kid I didn’t particularly enjoy that kind of sport much.
So when I moved into my current apartment community, housing nearly two thousand flats, it felt nostalgic because the campus had multiple patches of large open areas which meant it was a boon for dog owners (and heaven for their dogs).
Few years back, it wasn’t uncommon to see few fitness conscious dogs taking regular morning and evening walks (along with their disinterested owners) inside the apartment campus. But as the resident population grew, the population of pets followed suit. Pretty soon, it became a common practice for dogs to relieve themselves anywhere in the campus.
The pet owners perhaps assumed that cleaning was a responsibility of maintenance staff which resulted in a campus littered with dog poop everywhere. It was ironical that the mess was equally disturbing for all residents (including those offending dog owners) but it was quite logical, in absence of any specific laws about pet poop mis-management, for people to keep their houses clean and compromise with the common area.
I couldn’t help but marvel at Aristotle’s insight about this issue. He said –
What is common to many is taken least care of, for all men have greater regard for what is their own than for what they possess in common with others.
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