I took Betty outside to romp, and she spotted an enormous cat on the property behind ours. She stared at it for a long time since it looked like a larger version of the attack cat we sometimes encounter on our walks—a cat that has learned to leave Betty alone. When it was clear that this cat was simply large and indolent, Betty decided that she wanted a new friend, but the damn fence was in the way.
Betty pushed on the fence a bit with her front paws, but it didn’t move. The only thing left to do was to bark an invitation to play to the cat. Who could resist an invitation made with the deep bass barks that the pretend dogs in the neighborhood envy? The cat could and did resist. It looked terrified, but it was too dimwitted to do anything other than freeze in place.
The failure of the cat to accept Betty’s kind invitation was annoying, and the barks became elongated into a near howl. Betty had not howled before, and the strangeness and newness of howling caused her to pause briefly in contemplation. She must have decided that howling is pretty cool since she let off two more pretty good howls before giving up on the cat and walking away to sniff stuff.
The question now is how do we advance Betty’s howling education? There are no howling gurus nearby, and my howling is pathetic. Cats are inherently unreliable, and squirrels run away before any howling can start. Betty will just have to teach herself. She is probably okay with that.