I adopted a dog two years ago that had been abused and was quite shy of people. On the advice of a trainer, I started daily walks with Atticus, a large Great Pyrenees mix, in downtown Northampton, an activity we continue to this day as often as we can.
I am writing to publicly thank the many homeless people and panhandlers I’ve gotten to know and appreciate through Atticus. Without exception, they have helped show my fearful, shy dog that people can be loving, gentle and generous.
I enlisted several to help by having them give Atticus biscuits and allow him to interact at his own pace. Atticus is now thriving and he meets his friends on the street with enthusiasm. We need to change the prevailing conversation that Northampton’s homeless panhandlers are “a problem” for the downtown.
Too many letters to the Gazette describe them as aggressive and annoying but I’m downtown often, probably more than most visitors, and I’ve never experienced them as anything but polite and low-key given the grief extended to them by passersby.
One man sits in front of a store on Main Street with a sign and never says anything — it took months for him to speak a word to me, but he is wonderful with Atticus. Is there really a difference between these individuals and those soliciting money for political campaigns, the bell-ringers during the holiday season, the kids asking for change outside the bank to pay for a school trip?
All of these people make Northampton’s downtown what it can be — an interesting place to go with a dog who needs socialization and a human who enjoys all that the downtown has to offer.
Elizabeth Denny
Florence