I’m convinced that petting a puppy is good luck.

That’s the rub with dogs. We pack a lifetime of love into a too-short span of time. We have to watch them die. We have to let them go.

Love is love,” I told her, as I tell all of my patients who are ashamed to find themselves shattered by the death of a dog. “Loss is loss.

This house is just a thing... On your love list, always put the beating hearts at the top.

Shoot. It’s always so disappointing to realize the world goes on without me.

I liked the idea of adopting a dog that was beyond the puppy stage, a dog with an unknown span of life under his belt. It seemed only fair; he didn’t know what he was getting into with me either.

Back to that very first bite of hidden cupcake in the pantry: a soft cap of vanilla buttercream giving way to light, creamy mocha cake. I kept eating, turning the cupcake slowly in my hand. This was not rich, one-bite-and-you-couldn’t-possibly-have-more chocolate. This was refined, complex chocolate cut with a hint of coffee and what else... Currant? Salt? A grown-up, masterful cupcake. It was perfect.

I’ve always had this feeling,” Henry says, “that all dogs are really therapy dogs.

Over the previous few weeks, I’d finally perfected the Julia St. Clair wedding cupcake: classic lemon cake with a hidden heart of my mom’s boldly flavoured passion fruit filling, slathered high with Julia’s favorite vanilla buttercream icing and glammed up a bit with sparkling curls of candied lemon rind.

Sometimes grief cuts us off from the people and activities we love for the simple reason that we don’t want to feel happy, which feels too much like moving on.