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Do Dogs Take on the Personality of their Owners? Let’s Find Out

June 14, 2020

A pandemic is happening!  We’re from NYC, but with a mandatory quarantine looming, a laundry list of new socially distancing rules to follow, and a likely scenario that we’d be spending countless hours in a NYC apartment that wasn’t turning bigger overnight, the family decided to pack up and head to Massachusetts.  Temporarily leaving NYC was tough because I am a creature of habit and don’t care to be away for more than a week, but we knew we needed space for work and kids and our almost 15 year old furbaby, Randall.  And so we were off to a new normal of Zoom classes and rural living in a far off distant state – or so it feels.

It was the right decision for us, but was it good for Randall?  Hmmm, maybe.   I remember reading about a couple with an older dog that wanted to give their dog all sorts of life experiences.  Randall has been a city dog all of his life, so with that spirit, I figured let’s spend a couple of weeks together in a rural area and give him (and me) new experiences, too.  Well, those two weeks have now turned to almost three months and I think we have had our fill of new experiences for the moment.

Our new  normal started out with some amazement and new places to explore.  It reminded me of Randall as a puppy exploring Central Park.  For those that have never been, it’s an amazing area in a bustling city that’s completely “nature” with green grassy knolls, winding pathways, and beautiful trees and manicured plants, complete with an amazing spirit of NY’ers and tourists alike.  This wasn’t quite that – in a nutshell, this nature came with more bugs, a traveling turtle, noisy woodpeckers, lots of weeds and brush, and a brook.  There is a brook.  And, so we went to the brook.  We went to the brook, to the small quaint town, ran on grass, strolled around certain pathways – that all happened within the first week.  And we were happy, and excited.  We had made the most of a very unfortunate situation.

But after all this time, though – the comforts of our home are missed.  The bustle of the city, the dog friends (his AND mine), familiar scents, and stopping by stores like Pottery Barn and Apple.  I am looking forward to our return journey there – we haven’t decided when that happens, but I’m hopeful it’s soon.  So this begs the question – does my dog take after me – is it my fault he’s not as happy as he should be in the mountains?  Let’s do some comparisons – in bold are the parts that are common between me and him.

he’s bored

he’d rather be home in his NYC apartment

he misses his friends

he’s tired

That about sums up the experiment and proves our dogs can sometimes take on the personality of their owners.

Thanks for reading.


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