SLARVATHOffice of Off-World Correspondence

Monochrome overhead surveillance frame of a suburban block, tree canopies and a small park at one corner
PASS 0144
1655 LOCAL
HAZE
RESIDENTIAL
Two dogs meeting nose to nose on a suburban sidewalk, both leads slack, their people standing apart and cut off below the shoulders
a quarter of a minute
Medium — 35mm
SLV-0144

The Greeting

The small four-legged animals here are required to be tied to a person, and when two of them meet on the sidewalk both people stop and let the animals decide.

There is no hurry in it. The people say nothing to each other of any consequence. The animals establish whatever it is they establish, and then everybody carries on, and the whole event takes perhaps a quarter of a minute.

Ommet did this. Ommet did it with everything — with the door, with the low wall, with my brother, with a stone that had been in the same place its entire life. Ommet had to know a thing before Ommet could be near it, and the knowing took no time at all and could not be hurried.

I stood at the corner for a while. One of them came over and knew me. The person apologised.

There was nothing to apologise for.

Office annotationCorrespondent SLV-4 refers to domestic dogs. The Office notes that leash requirements are municipal and vary. The name given in the third paragraph does not correspond to any entry in the Correspondent's household record. The vessel is not present in this frame.