Up very early this morning, not even 3am, because I couldn’t sleep. Toby got up, too, thinking, as he often does, that this means it’s time for breakfast, which it almost always is, for him, as soon as I get up. But not today, not this early. He tests me many times, heading toward the kitchen, hopping up and down, doing the entire repertoire of excited doggie tricks he enlists to enroll me in the euphoria of his mealtime. But, I don’t fall for it. I sit on the sofa, pull out my laptop; he sits beside me on the couch, sighing for effect, letting me understand his disappointment that he doesn’t get to have breakfast during what is, essentially, the middle of the night. I stand firm, however, not giving in to the manipulations of my little canine boy, until, at last, he hops down from the couch, wanders back into the bedroom and waits for me to come and pick him up onto the bed so he can go back to sleep.

Sometime, I hope to be able to explain to him the advantages of delayed gratification but, since he’s a food-motivated dog, I’m not so sure how that will work out.

I’ve been reading Anne Lamott essays for the past couple of hours – crying, laughing – and feeling grateful there is someone on this earth who understands the rust spots on a tarnished soul, pointing out that rust is just oxidation and oxidation means that something has just been working extra hard to be seen. JS