The Long Straight Road

A true story from my running days in Mandeville.

Back when I attended West Indies College in Mandeville, Manchester, Jamaica, now Northern Caribbean University, I used to run very early in the morning, around 5am. I enjoyed having the entire road to myself, as there were no vehicles out at that time, maybe one or two some mornings, but generally I had the road to myself, except for some dogs along the way. The first time I ran past Knockpatrick from where I stayed with a Professor and his family, there were some dogs that joined me; I think they were bored. I naturally had an understanding with dogs, so I knew they would run behind me until they were tired, and when I returned as the sun started rising they hardly raised their heads. That exercise continued for some days until they hardly paid me any mind.

One morning, I found a road I hadn't noticed before. I think I just happened to look right when I usually looked left for one of the turns near the start of my run. It was a long, straight and beautiful dirt road which, unbeknownst to me, was actually private property, the entrance where the large trucks from Alcan, the bauxite company, came in. I was not thinking straight, now that I think of it, but I could not resist the temptation to run on that road. So I turned onto it and kept running.

So I began enjoying the run, but boy was I in for a surprise. As I started to run up a slight gradient, I was immediately surrounded by Doberman dogs; I can only guess maybe eight, since they all surrounded me. They were very silent, not a bark like the other mongrel dogs who by this time had got bored of running me down. Not even a growl. Then they started to slowly close in.

By this time I had stopped running. I don't recall my emotion at the time, but I do remember that I understood the danger I was in. I instinctively started to snap my fingers to a rhythm. Snap… snap… snap… Maybe because I had concluded they were trained, I really don't know, but I started snapping to a rhythm.

Then they stopped closing in, their ears all perked up, and they stopped moving. So I took that as my opportunity to slowly walk past the ones closest to me, exit the circle, and continue walking backwards toward the entrance while they stayed still and just looked at me as I slowly walked away.

As I reached the corner I continued my run on my normal route. The whole situation was weird, and for a while I was lost in thought and grateful to God for keeping me safe. I don't recall sharing this with anyone, especially the Professor I was staying with, because I feared he would have told me not to go out running again. I figured I had it covered, just keep to the normal route.

I've thought about that morning many times since. I concluded that God led me to snap my fingers to the rhythm that safely took me out of danger. I also learned that staying calm and level headed gave me the one thing fear would have taken away, a clear head, long enough to find a way out.

When the dogs surround you, don't let fear do your thinking for you.