1. Truth: My two dogs drive me crazy and keep me sane. I know that’s a contradiction, but it’s exactly how it is. They ask for so much, need so much, and so often it isn’t convenient or easy. And yet, without them my life would seem empty, there would be too much space and it would be too quiet.

2. Truth: The fact that they don’t live very long is the most inconvenient thing about them. Facebook reminded me today that four years ago, one of my favorite dogs of all time died. Rocky was a bullmastiff that belonged to my in-laws. We met him first when he was only weeks old, and for the last half of his life, he lived here, close to us, and we spent a lot of time with him. I was lucky enough to be with him when he died. He was a big dog, 130+ pounds, and his heart was the biggest thing about him.

3. Truth: We are all impermanent, and everything changes. We can get caught up in generating a lot of suffering about this, get worked up about how unfair it all is (this is my favorite response), or we can meet change as it arises with curiosity and compassion, be as fully with our loss and our grief as we are with love and joy.

One wish: That no matter what might arise for us, whatever obstacle or gift, we meet it with an open heart.

The camera on my new phone takes amazing pictures

1. Truth: I almost forgot to write this post this week. It’s Spring Break at CSU, so I’m taking the week off from that work as much as I can, which always makes me confused about what day of the week it is. On Monday, Eric and I went to dinner at Mount Everest Cafe, one of our favorite places, and I said to him “it’s really quiet in here for a weekend” and he said, “that’s because it’s Monday.” I laughed and told him, “don’t let me forget to go teach my yoga class in the morning!” Daylight Savings time, being an hour off, meant I didn’t really know what time it was for a few days either.

2. Truth: Adulting is hard. Most days I’m pretty good at it, but yesterday I failed, miserably. I’m sad because a dear friend’s dear dog has cancer and Eric is going out of town for a conference. I’ve been depressed lately, so I was already low. Then we had a furnace guy come to do our free yearly maintenance that we haven’t had done in the fifteen years we’ve had this furnace and he, as expected, found all sorts of things wrong, things that to fix would cost almost as much as a whole new furnace, also as expected. But one of the things he found had nothing to do with the furnace — our new tub has apparently been leaking. And I’d spent the entire morning trying to back up my old phone so I could activate my new phone and in the process of that my old phone died for real and for good. I didn’t handle it very well, kind and gentle reader.

3. Truth: Still, life is good. On our walk the other day, I told Eric how good it was to feel strong again, to be able to walk without hurting the whole time. Later in the day, after my meltdown, Eric told me he’d read that my new phone’s camera had a feature where you could make little slow motion videos. I made one of him running across the dining room and it made us laugh so hard, which felt like such a relief after all the fussing that had come earlier. And I bought myself tulips and daffodils at Trader Joe’s on the way home from my physical therapy appointment yesterday, so even though it’s snowing outside this morning, I have a bit of spring inside.

One wish: That no matter how confused or turned around we get, no matter how frustrated or upset, we find our way back to sanity. May we know the relief of laughter and always keep that little bit of spring inside.