Thursday morning, near 3:00AM. I probably would have slept later but Shadow, while scratching her claws on the ottoman, caught one of her nails in the fabric and screamed for a solid thirty seconds before either she or I extracted the nail. The incident scared the shit out of me. My poor dog. I thought she was going to die. Well, the adrenalin coursing through my veins pretty much guaranteed I won’t be asleep again anytime soon. I love my dog so much. It’s funny, I believe Shadow and I met in my second year at Ailbe’s, which would make her coming on fourteen years old this fall. We have been together through so much. She has slept next to me 360 out of 365 days a year that entire time. When she was little, for about a week, she slept in a box in the bathroom. She pretty much demanded, over time, though, to sleep on the bed. She cheerfully kept trying to sleep next to us until we gave up and let her. After the nail incident I carried her upstairs and put her on the low bed in the Wii room. She’s sleeping next to me now. You know, I almost feel like we’re in a hospital and I’m telling someone “she’s resting.” Someday somebody’s going to say the same thing about me. “He’s resting.” While I sleep and everybody knows I’m going to die sooner or later.

Yesterday was a wash. I didn’t do much of anything. Within about 12 hours, though, I’ll be done with work for a solid week. Ok, here’s a goal. I may not check work email for a solid week. I haven’t done that in six and a half years. Even when I was in fucking Italy I walked over to the internet café and checked my email. I’ll have to set Corey up to email me separately, because he and I talk a lot through work email, but other than that I’m leaving the email alone. I’m also going to try to stay off the computer for everything but journaling and a couple message boards. I want to see how it feels.

Oh, yesterday I did manage to find a few minutes in the library corner chair. Although the heater or security system (I couldn’t decide which) buzzed while I read, I still felt safe and calm in the corner. I didn’t feel beat down. Good morning.