Can you tell what your dog’s thinking? A 'mother’s guide to Dog Speak

In spite of your dog’s innocent “I didn’t do it” expression, you can tell when your pup is feeling guilty, can’t you? I mean ― does your dog just about give himself away when he’s done something wrong? My dog, Benny, actually confesses. He drops his stuffed bunny’s torn-off head into my hand.

I’m pretty sure that you and I are alike when it comes to our dog family. We know what they’re thinking; we know what they’re trying to say. I imagine you and I are also alike when it comes to seeing a story on TV about an injured or abused dog; we either look away, mute the sound, or change the channel.

Today I caught Benny digging a hole in our backyard that could have held all Four Tops in it. My problem is not so much that he digs; I want him to have fun. It’s just that he’s dug so many holes, my landscape looks like the surface of the moon. There’s nary a day I don’t tumble into a crater.

'Benny, what have you done?'

Now, he knows he’s not supposed to dig. So I said. “Benny, what have you done?” He could tell by my tone he was in the doghouse. He cringed, then squinted his eyes shut as if I was going to smash him with a sledgehammer. He refused to look at me and hung his head in shame. You know what I mean; the same fake shtick your dog tries to pull.

Perhaps yours is over-the-top melodramatic like mine. When I even whisper the word, “no,” Benny starts his, “I-don’t-deserve-to-live,” routine.

When I say, “no,” to my other dog, Mendel, he lays the guilt on thick: “Remember I’m going to die someday.”

So while Benny, whose face was covered in fresh dirt, was pretending to feel remorse today, I figured he was saying, “It wasn’t me!”

“Well, who was it, then? Missus No-Head Bunny?”

Benny is the follower, Mendel does the plotting

Benny is not way up there when it comes to smarts. In the three years since I adopted the lovable little runt, he hasn’t learned his name. He is clueless as to who my husband, his father, Bob, is and goes into an insane screeching roar whenever Bob comes in the room.

I picked him up (he’s little) and brought him in the house, where I banished him to the bedroom.

That was when Mendel, his brother-in-crime, came trotting into the kitchen where I was standing. He carped, “I need a real treat, not the dog crapola dreck (Yiddish for manure) you keep giving us.”

Now, this clever dog plots out ways to get Benny in trouble. Between the two of them, Mendel is the brains and Benny is the brawn.

I’m sure that Mendel goaded Benny into the archeological expedition out back.

Mendel: “Let’s surprise Mom and make her a swimming pool. You start.”

Naïve Benny falls for this stuff ― every single time.

From the kitchen, I heard our three cats howling during one of their, “Mom ― a mouse! And there’s a chance we’ll eat it,” tantrums.

Now, when it comes to mice, I no longer support male/female equality. Mouse eviction is a man’s job. “Oh Bob,” I’ll call out with a Scarlett O’Hara drawl. Coyly, I’ll sing out, “I do declare that as God is my witness, there’s a critter on the loose right here in Tara. Now, be a man and make everything better.”

Bob lures mice with gumdrops

Bob loves me deeply, so he does do the mouse work. But he won’t kill a mouse. (He takes houseflies outside ― seriously.) He’ll put gumdrops as bait into a Havahart trap that captures creatures alive.

Both dogs decided to chase the howling cats who were, of course, chasing the mouse who tried racing into his very own (yes, he’s done this before) one-millionth-of-an-inch hole, at which point Bob chased the whole shrieking posse with a gumdrop in his hand.

The mouse made it to his microscopic den. Bob got the Havahart.

Now, don’t get me wrong about Mendel’s scheming ways. Although he likes to set Benny up as the fall dog/guy, he’s a wonderful mutt. He adores me as I adore him. His whole solar system revolves around me. He and I sleep with the entire length of our bodies against each other’s. So we’re inseparable ― in many ways.

He’s smart. Without me saying a word, he “stays” when my palm’s out; he “sits” when I point upward, and lays down when I point downward. He’d let a hot dog drop from between his clenched teeth if I so much as whisper, “Leave it.” Mendel will back up and wait his turn when I hold up a treat and say, “This one’s for Benny.”

I must tell you, though. My heart aches for Benny. As you can see from the photo, he’s no Denzel (my vote for the world’s most handsome human being). Benny’s always on the bottom of the dog hierarchy ladder ― not because of Mendel but because he thinks he’s not worthy of a higher position, or praise, or love, or even living in a real home.

Benny is terrified of my cane ― or any stick-like object. Originally, he was found roaming the streets of rural Texas, eating whatever he could find on the roads or in garbage cans. His panic at even the slightest movement of my cane tells me he was beaten with sticks.

What Benny lacks in brains is made up for by what he has in his heart. He lives and breathes for me ― my touch, my voice, my presence. Every time he so much as looks at me, he wags his tail in bliss.

'Who does this?'

I hurt when I think of Mendel’s past. He lived with a family in a big house in Alabama. But when the people moved away, they left Mendel behind to fend for himself. Abandoned, all alone with no provisions. No food or water was left out. Nothing. No furniture, no beds. The rescue organization found him cowering on the hard floor by a fireplace.

Sometimes I could scream. Sometimes I just cry. I mean ― who does this?

But it all worked out; Benny and Mendel get along so perfectly, they’re like peanut butter and coffee ice cream.

I bet, like me, you love your dog as much as you love your human family.

My beloved dogs believe that the sun rises and sets on me. Their day begins with me. And ends with me.

And what do they mean in my heart of hearts? The same as your dog means to you.

Everything.

Award-winning columnist, Saralee Perel, lives in Marstons Mills. She can be reached at sperel@saraleeperel.com or via Facebook. Her column runs the first Friday of each month.  

This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: Column: Loving your dogs like the family members they are