Le Mort de Barkus

Old Barkus, as in "Barkus is willing" from Dickens' David Copperfield, is dead. The pembroke corgi was very nearly fifteen years old and trouble from the start, but a charming companion for my father through the loss of his wife of 44 years, through the interim before meeting Mary, his partner for nearly ten years, and his move from independent living into a managed care facility. Barkus was my father's favorite companion through these years, surely a member of the family. Old Barkus destroyed furniture, shoes, bedding, underwear. He seldom came when called and often ran the opposite direction. He was wily and wiggley, not the sort of dog that liked stroking. But he was a character. Dad will miss him the most of all. Only a month before, the Manor where Dad stayed had said enough. Barkus was defecating and pissing in the lobby. Dad was unable to control him. He stayed with us for a while, but the city streets were hard on his paw, and nearly crippled him. He move to Dad's ladyfriend's daughter's house, and seemed to be settling in. It is another milestone to pass. Dad's last dog. I am sure he thinks about this. I said, "Well, Dad, now we can get you a turtle or a parakeet." He said, "thanks a lot," but he smiled. I think I wrote it somewhere before: old dogs die.

It's Columbia!

Ah, well, beware what you wish, because miraculous things happen!  Sophie's choice chose Sophie, and now she will go to school in NYC, uptown at Columbia University.  An amazing coup, if you had asked me.  Some 25,000 kids wanted to go there in the fall and there are but 1400 places for them, so including those who decided to go elsewhere, the acceptance rate was about 8.8% this year, the same as Princeton's, a bit less crushing than Yale and Harvard.

An accomplishment to be proud of!  And I am reconciling myself to the notion, although it feels a little sad that she did not want Princeton the way I did, or my father did once upon a time. Sophie was the only student in the entire Providence area to be on the waitling list at Princeton. They wanted to know whether she wished to come, perhaps advised that she wanted NYC more by her advisor, who understood this to be Sophie's wish.  Columbia is Sophie' Choice: it is HERS, who cares about mine?  There is no legacy, no inside scoop, nothing but herself to get her in.  

We visited the campus and were immediately taken.  Internships!  The Core Curriculum!  The City!  I think Columbia will be an excellent fit, especially when Sophie overcomes the initial shock of the City and leaving home, and goes after whatever it is that she wants.  No school can offer all the job connections of Manhattan as Columbia will.  It seems that Columbia is taking advantage of its #1 natural resource.

Since this time, we have more or less figured out the financial component to attending Columbia and it is possible, making it appear that we actually knew what we were doing in this whole process, which would be a marvellous overstatement, to say the least.

But it all looks possible.  We have made it to this stage; now.  We will need to adjust our sights upon the next hurdle.  Isn't this always the way?