By their canine personalities ye shall know them

Martha (left) and Aquinnah

Any dog owner will tell you that our four-legged pals have unique personalities, and that these quirks, habits and attitudes manifest themselves in dozens of ways. Take our duo, for example. Five-year-old Aquinnah, a chocolate lab, basically is calm, mild-mannered, and lazy (except when he sees that most evil of all creatures in his world view - a crow). Two-year-old Martha, a pit bull/lab mix, is high-strung, jittery, energetic, and - it pains me to admit it - neurotic.

These qualities are on display all the time, even when Quinn and Martha are doing something as simple as waiting for a piece of the fruit bar I have every morning, after my cereal. The rules of our little ritual require that the dogs sit at my feet while I eat the bar, the last bite of which is split between them.

Under their own mutually agreed upon arrangement, Quinn always sits on my left, Martha to my right. Then things get interesting.

While I work my way down to that last bit of bar that has “doggies” written all over it, Quinn stares at me with a laser-like focus. He does not so much as move a muscle, and he never takes his eyes off the bar as it gets ever smaller.

Martha, on the other hand, has eyes everywhere. First, she looks at the bar in my hand, but only momentarily. Then she shifts her gaze to the floor, to make sure her treat hasn’t landed there unnoticed. She peers up at me after that, to check my progress ("what is taking him so long?") before scanning the room to fend off any potentially intrusive cats (even though the cats have no interest in fruit bars). Finally, Martha looks up once more, just as her snack is about to be served.