Years ago, before everybody was on the Internet, I worked briefly at a small weekly newspaper. The office had a fax machine. Every morning, reliably, there would be a growing stack of thermal paper faxes that we had received overnight. Fax messages for us to trawl through for anything potentially newsworthy.
Mostly though the faxes were yet more public service announcements from the local council or government or related organisations. The editor was lazy and often just recycled selected pieces word-for-word to fill up the newspaper's pages. Then continue to challenge the Advertising Manager about dropping ad sales.
Around this time there seemed also to be a growing trend of 'raising awareness' by various groups and worthwhile charities to appoint a day or week of the year for their cause. A National Day for This. A National Day for That. These quickly took up many acres of fax transmissions.
The good causes may include obscure medical conditions. Bringing attention to endangered species. Or even just sparing a thought and doing something special for people in often thankless service roles.
With the advent of the Internet and spreading the word for free, this trend has exploded.
Of course it's affected the world of dogs. There isn't just a national dog appreciation day. With hundreds of recognised breeds, the calendar year can fill up quickly with National Beagle Appreciation Day. Husky Day. French Bulldog Day.
There is a Dog Groomer Appreciation Day. A day for veterinarians. A National Professional Pet Sitters WEEK (surely the groomers deserve a week if ever there was a service that required more understanding and appreciation).
It gets better. Possibly taking her cue from so-called National Hugging Day, the American dog behaviourist Ami Moore created National Hug Your Dog Day in 2006.
You could say this is all a bit mad. And I do. But taking a day out to recognise others has a worthy heritage.
Mothering Sunday is an example. According to Google's AI, a day of recognition for our mothers can be traced back to the sixteenth century. And apparently this may even have roots in pagan celebrations during Ancient Greek and Roman times.
In 1914 the US President declared Mother's Day a national holiday to be observed on the second Sunday in May.
Of course it wasn't long before this all got commercialised. Any cynic will quickly reason that greetings card companies did well by this sort of thing. Certainly in an age before the Internet and social media.
But to my point. Today, September 8th, is National Dog Walker Appreciation Day. In the United States, to be clear. Yes, started by a pet product company.
You can read all about it on 'nationaltoday.com', a fairly authoritative looking website dedicated to all the days of the calendar year that have been appointed a day of recognition for something or someone. I expect they've missed a few. The causes keep multiplying.
Like the weekly newspaper all those years ago, it must be a website that is easy-to-assemble. Copy-paste all the ready-made content from all those worthy causes and the virtue-signalling companies. Arguably a bit too earnest and saccharine to have much readership appeal I would think. But maybe still a worthy reminder, today in particular, of those who help us out with our dogs.
It takes a village to raise a child, according to a Nigerian proverb. For those of us with a dog in the family, sometimes it also takes a bit of help from friends and professionals. So with kindness rather than cynicism, a gesture of recognition herewith for the professional dog walkers who help ensure our dogs benefit from secure play, exercise, socialisation and, if wagging tails are anything to go by, then also the genuine love and friendship the dog walker brings to the lives of our dogs.