Today, we lit up the living room wood stove for the first time since April, the stoves produce a warm, even, comfortable heat, Maria asked me this morning if I would help her rest – she is still trying to get her studio working again after the Open House (which she says we will do again next year in a different form).

We both are tired, she was exhausted. When that happens, we have a pact, we each remind the other to stop working, and relax. After my writing workshop, we went to the dump, then we did relax.

We took a nap, lit the fire, plunged into our books. Bud, as you can see has co-opted the corner of the couch, that is his spot now, even though dogs are not allowed on sofas in our house. My shoe was missing again, it was under the dining room table.

You can see how well  Bud has settled into our lives, and how comfortable Red and Fate are with him.

Red and  Fate love being near the fire also. Dogs how how to rest, it is natural to them, and they love to relax with us, which makes it even sweeter.

Maria and I are not good at relaxing, it is not natural to either of us, and we both need help in doing it. Tomorrow, we will try to relax again. We both wake up on fire – we need to do this, we need do that.

It is spiritually, emotionally and physically essential that we learn to be calm and grounded.

So I am planning for it.

I want to take Maria out somewhere for breakfast  tomorrow (she is doing an interview in WBTN with Thomas Toscano about her art (9 a.m. to 10 a.m., you can live stream it here.

Since my open heart surgery, and at the advice of several doctors, I have taken up the occasional art of napping, I lie down sometime in the late afternoon, put my earphones on my Iphone, put on some music – Van Morrison or Gillian Welch or Roy Orbison these days, and doze for half an hour.

Then I wake up, mind racing and get to work. We need to do better at relaxing, and today went well. I made dinner, brought Maria tea, and rubbed her feet, her great weakness.

She’s back reading, surrounded by dogs, all of whom have abandoned me for the wood stove fire. They know how to relax. My study is pretty cold. Tomorrow, I’m hoping to take Maria to see a movie, Tea With The Dames, starring Dames Eileen Atkins, Judi Dench, Joan Plowright and Maggie Smith. What a gathering of brilliance.