Dog Tale 9: William and the Pit Bull

William is not an aggressive dog, and, for most of his life, he rarely, if ever, barked. One summer night, a couple of years ago, William and I ran into a Gossips reader I'd never met before as we were leaving Lick. (William had indulged in a Betsy's Bow Wow.) She was walking a pit bull--a very nice, well behaved pit bull, unlike some of that breed William had encountered previously. To my surprise and embarrassment, the usually very laid back William skipped all of his typical "getting to know you" routine and immediately barked at the dog in a not very friendly way. I apologized for William's bad behavior, explaining that he never barked at other dogs. The woman, whom I had just met, suggested, jokingly I thought at the time, that William was "profiling."