ID Card — A First
Yesterday, my mother, half-brother and I went out to a local Chinese restaurant to celebrate his birthday and I was quite shocked when the owner came over to me asking for my “dog card.” Through some amazing stroke of luck foresight, I had taken the card out of the depths of my wallet and stuck it in my jacket pocket back at home. The woman took one quick glance at it, thanked me and walked off, leaving me sitting there quite shocked at the entire set of events.
In the eight years I had worked Dolly I had never once been asked for any form of ID to prove she was a guide dog. Granted, I can count on one hand the number of access issues we had had over the years, but even of those her status as a guide dog was never contested. Ironically, it’s probably a good thing I was never asked to produce the card GEB had made for me as I’d lost it sometime rather soon after training what with all the moving a college student does.
Admittedly I’m not an expert on the intricacies of access laws, but I didn’t think it was legal to require that one produced “certification” of a service animal’s status. Then again, this was told to me years ago and I’m certainly not saying I recall all the chatter I’d heard about the subject correctly nor that it wouldn’t have changed. Either way, I’m quite glad I thought to bring my card with me and more that the restaurant owner didn’t make a big fuss about Yara.