Children are taught to control their impulses, to think before they do or say something adults might consider bad. In my case, I certainly have learned over the years not to act as impulsively as I did when I was 3 or 4 — though I have to admit that I never quite got down pat the bit about making sure you really want to say something before you actually say it.

Now let us consider President Trump.

Political commentators, talking heads, and a panoply of professionals in the psychiatric fields have chimed in about his impulse control, or lack thereof. If you and I say something without thinking, it can have any range of effects, from the comedic to the offensive. But when the president of the United States erupts with unchecked expressions of unfiltered emotion — explosions of anger or wounded pride — the results, obviously, are on a much more fearsome scale. 

Recently, President Trump retweeted three videos from an anti-Muslim hate group called Britain First without bothering to find out what the group stood for or what the British people might think of it. Following this, in the words of Jake Tapper, the CNN anchor, “concerns about the behavior and judgment” of the president “consumed a great deal of time in Parliament”; the United States Embassy in London was “bracing for violence because of the president’s impulse-control issues.” 

Steve Schmidt, an adviser to the administration of George W. Bush who was the manager of John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign, was even more scathing. “Clearly,” Mr. Schmidt was quoted as saying, “we have a 71-year-old president of the United States who has the impulse control of a little child, who feels aggrieved, who’s resentful, who’s a constant victim.” 

The “she said/he said” exchange that followed between President Trump and Prime Minister Theresa May made it clear that the president is content with whatever he blurts out, and that he cannot admit a mistake.

While we’re discussing toddler-stage emotional-development milestones, how about the related concept of delayed gratification? Depending on which source you consult, Mr. Trump has been accused of sexual harassment by 11 or 16 women. Last week, he started calling the “Access Hollywood” audio tape — in which he spoke unforgettably about his free pass, as celebrity, to grab women by the private parts — a fake, even though he had previously admitted it was indeed him on the recording. Children of 3 or 4 typically cannot stop themselves from reaching to grab candy when it comes into view, but what about a grown man who reaches out to grab women he’s never met before but considers attractive? 

Psychology Today says that you can help  youngsters learn to regulate their emotions by certain time-tested strategies, like being a good role model; getting children to talk about their thoughts and connecting them to their feelings; offering them limited but positive choices that allow them to develop a sense of self-confidence as independent decision-makers, and offering consistent discipline with a system of expressed expectations, rewards, and consequences.

President Trump isn’t going to appreciate any attempts at parental-style behavior mentoring from anyone on the Democratic side, but some senior figure in the G.O.P. might get results by taking on the role of stern father, strict mother, or super nanny. I wish Senator McCain were healthy enough to discipline Mr. Trump with the requisite pats on the head and raps on the knuckles. It might just have worked.

Coal was in short supply as 1917 came to an end. I did not know this until recently, when I was reading the front page of a copy of The Star that was scanned and digitized by the East Hampton Library.

L.E. Terry, the local fuel administrator under a federal wartime program, wrote what amounted to the lead article on the Jan. 4, 1918, issue. In it, he outlined the strict questions that coal dealers had been ordered by Washington to ask each customer to determine if anyone might be hoarding coal. Printed cards would soon be distributed for coal buyers to sign, attesting that they were only ordering enough for their immediate needs.

If conditions persisted, East Hampton residents would soon have to burn wood for heat, Terry wrote.  Suffolk County had plenty of that, and wooded areas would benefit from cutting, leaving new growth a chance to spread out. It was, he argued, the patriotic duty of wood-lot owners to cut wood themselves or allow someone else to do so. Owners of wood lots who refused should be reported, he wrote.

Wood lots were an old idea in East Hampton. Most of the families who established footholds here in the 17th century were granted them by the town trustees, acreage not suitable for farming but from which a supply of timber and wood for heat and cooking could be maintained. On old maps, land ownership in Northwest Woods appears in long, narrow blocks; these were the wood lots, though they now are broken up to accommodate houses and driveways, pools, tennis courts, and such.

The 1917-18 coal shortage was the result of a bottleneck in transportation more than a reflection of a drop in mining or soaring demand. Even though coal producers were increasing their output at a remarkable rate, wartime production had placed new demands on the nation’s rail system, making it difficult for all that newly mined coal to get where it had to go. Then, an early season blizzard that brought the Northeast to a standstill crimped the supply further.

Coal and the transportation pinch are thought to be one of the reasons President Wilson decided to nationalize the railroads at the end of December 1917. They would return to private control in 1920.

At the time of the 1917-18 coal crisis, some newspapers speculated that coal’s day would soon end and that a century later, its use would be abandoned. Though that day may still come, and nobody much uses coal to directly heat their house today, coal fuels a large share of the electricity produced today. And most of it is still carried by rail.

They’re always saying everybody dies peacefully or comfortably surrounded by their families. But I don’t believe it. Why? Because if you’re surrounded by your family, there’s precious little air left to breathe.

Mary laughed just now in looking over my shoulder, and then added, “But you’re always talking about dying.”

“But dying is a big part of life,” I said. 

I liked the way our cat did it. He just went off by himself, and when, finally, he dragged himself to our back lawn he had no strength to resist when Mary gathered him up in her arms and gently placed him on our bed. 

We tried not to surround him — we tried to give him room so that he could instruct us, which he did. He reached forth, let it go, leaped into the vastness — as we will someday, I hope, without picking at the coverlet. I’d prefer death to be what happens to me when I’m making other plans. I’ve always liked the way they used to say “death overtook him. . . .” (Actually, in my case it wouldn’t be a great feat.)

But back to life and liveliness and to making plans, which we still do, though we agree we have no goals other than to continue loving, laughing, and, in my case, lifting quotes so this column can continue to move forward, as they also say, and frequently, these days, primarily by people who’ve been caught with their pants down, which makes it difficult to move forward until they’re cinched up.

We were asked specifically what our goals were the other night, in connection with estate planning, and, as I say, other than to continue living, working, and toasting one an other as the sun sets on having made it through yet another day free from sobriety’s icy grip, we couldn’t think of any.

Just keep on sailing, the old lover says to the ferryman — or words to that effect — in “Love in the Time of Cholera.” Just keep on sailing. Mary’s actually flying as I write — on a mission of mercy (as are most of her missions) to Southern California. She is needed there, an accident having happened when our daughter and son-in-law weren’t expecting that they’d have to make other plans. 

“Wouldn’t it be great if we could beam you here?” she said the night before she left to one of our grandsons in Ohio. “Whoosh!”

He agreed that she was being a bit silly, but I like it when she is, when she is lighthearted. 

So she is being beamed to California. Well, not exactly. I think she has to stop in Salt Lake City first, and on the way back, 11 days hence, there are to be two stops — off-putting for one who prefers directness in her dealings. “Whoosh, whoosh.” She’s here, she’s there. . . .

We parted at Mary’s Marvelous (where else?) this morning, she with an avocado sandwich in hand and I with a cup of coffee. A kiss and she was gone, on her way. 

Later, while waiting at the gate, she apologized for the abruptness, but I told her it was just as well, that I was spared the tearing up. 

“I went and drowned my sorrows in tennis balls,” I said, which drew a laugh. 

Later, while walking O’en along Main Street, I saw a silver Prius turning into the parking lot and, for a moment, thought that it might be her. No such luck. That’s life. Death too.

The folks at the Animal Rescue Fund’s headquarters called her Victoria. She was, they said, a rescue from Puerto Rico, displaced during Hurricane Irma in September, and about 2 years old.

We had been frequenting ARF for more than a year, looking for just the right dog, and my husband connected with her first. I had arrived there later that day, to check out the dogs, and found him sitting with a funny little orange-red Chihuahua-terrier mix on his lap in ARF’s “living room.” A perfect dog for us?

With legs only about eight inches high, she broke a quickly forgotten rule by jumping up in delighted greeting. Although she didn’t smile, exactly, she danced on her hind legs like a circus dog, then stretched out her surprisingly long body so that we could pet her smooth, ginger-colored coat.

 When my daughter visited ARF to have a look at another dog or two that the very kind staff thought might be right for us, she and her kids fell in love with Victoria, instead. My daughter warned us that if we didn’t adopt her, she would. And so our new dog came home.

It all seemed predestined: Her color actually matched the big sleeping cushion I had set aside for her. She looked, from behind, extraordinarily like a red fox. She might not actually be 2 years old, but she is a perfect mix of energetic and lazy.

We discovered right away that she was a world-champion cuddler. She weighed about 20 pounds, and even I could lift her. My daughter took to draping her front paws over a shoulder and carrying her around. Being so well-mannered and of such tidy habits that she soon had the run of the house, the only rule was that she wouldn’t be allowed to sleep on our bed.

We were wishy-washy, however, about choosing a new name. Victoria seemed much too royal, and much too English, for our little red Puerto Rican fox-dog. 

Among the innumerable unconvincing suggestions for new names from various members of the family was Thunder, which my 8-year-old grandson Teddy thought would be good; Zorro, which for some reason my husband favored, and Winkie, from my daughter, who immediately changed her mind (even though the dog was tentatively called Winkie for a few days). 

Eventually we decided that she was the sweetest dog ever, and that her name was Sweet Pea. I hadn’t recalled immediately that Sweet Pea was the baby in the Popeye cartoons, but no matter: She was Sweet Pea. 

And Sweet Pea had some secrets. We had stocked up, of course, on dog treats, including those marketed as “chicken chews.” She was thrilled with them. She played adorably with the first two we gave her, tossing them in the air and rolling around, and when they disappeared from view, we assumed she had devoured them. A few days later, however, two or three large shreds of something or other on the living room window seat drew my attention. Aha! Chicken chews buried under an old paisley cushion! A second chew was found a few days later under an antique bedspread on an upstairs guest room bed.

Now, about two weeks after she came home, we have been amused at the gusto with which she barks at squirrels outside the sun porch windows. (Otherwise, she makes almost no noise. Another of her charms.) We’ve figured out exactly how much to feed her so that she cleans the bowl. And we have decided she is so sweet that she can sleep on our bed.

Looking through a box in the Star attic the other day, I noticed a narrow, cloth-bound ledger that looked interesting. A handwritten note tucked inside the front cover identified it as the Montauk Lighthouse visitors’ log from August 1908 to September 1910. Whoever had left the note indicated that the entries included an “auto run” in 1908, complete with the makes of the cars.

Flipping through the pages, I had the vague memory that someone had asked about this log some time ago, that it had belonged to a grandparent who had left it at The Star years ago and whose family had wanted it returned. I asked around; no one could remember who that might have been.

Chas. Wright of Brooklyn’s name is the first entry in the log, written in a big cursive hand on Aug. 22, 1908. The last entry is Mrs. H.C. Hoyt of Bensonhurst, on Sept. 26, 1910.

Local names appear by the plenty. My grandmother, who was called Nettie Edwards in those days, visited the Lighthouse on June 13, 1909, with her aunts Phoebe and Minnie Huntting. 

In July 1909, among the visitors to the Lighthouse signing the book were four members of the Roosevelt family, including John Ellis Roosevelt, a first cousin of President Theodore Roosevelt, who had left office just months earlier.

On Sept. 15, 1910, my great-great-grandmother’s name appears in a steady hand as Mrs. J.B. Edwards, Amagansett L.I. The 1908 N.Y. Automobile Trade Association Long Island Run arrived at Montauk Point on Sept. 17. About 27 people listed their names, alongside the makes of their vehicles. Unlike the other visitors’ signatures, theirs are hard to read, perhaps reflecting the long, hard miles they had traveled in their Rainier Motor Car Co. models, but if I can read one name correctly, a person named Anderson.

It was only after I put a photo of my grandmother’s signature on Instagram that the facts about whose logbook this was became clear. Barbara Borsack noticed the post and phoned to ask where I had found the logbook. Her father had lent it to my grandmother shortly before his death in 1974 of a stroke. Time intervened, and about a decade ago, Barbara inquired about it. I kept a Post-It on my desk for a while on the chance that it might turn up, but that, too, fell victim to time and disappeared.

The log had come into Barbara’s family via her great-great-grandfather James Scott, who was the keeper of the Light until 1910. Barbara’s great-grandmother had grown up in the Lighthouse as a young girl and recalled that visitors could be seen miles off over the treeless plain as they made the journey. There was often time enough to get something cooking so that they could have a hot meal ready by the time the guests arrived.

Now, Barbara plans to stop by the office to collect it. She told me she would look through it for a few days, then find it a secure home where it might in the future be accessible to the public.

I remembered Tony Demmers as I tried this morning to read upside down and backward the headlines of The New York Times’s first section that Mary, as usual, was reading with avidity.

Even with more avidity than usual, for it’s hard for common, everyday, ordinary people these days to keep up with all the goings-on, from the horrific to the banal, which confront you in about equally mind-boggling portions.

You’ll want to know something about Tony Demmers. He was the one who put the lines of type in the galleys in the hot-type days, and he could read as fast — or faster — upside down and backward than you or I can read right-side up and forward.

I can do it a bit, though Tony was way out of my league. He read more right-side up and forward than I did too.

Anyway, I could make out enough this morning to gather that the investigation as to whether you-know-who as a private citizen was tweeting with an enemy government before he was, in fact, elected to office (long live the Logan Act of 1799) might, in the end, be so vexing as to prompt a missile exchange with North Korea — to divert us, if you will. Just a wild surmise. Always jumping to conclusions. Pay no attention.

Is reality any different from our dream world? Which is half of our lives really, or almost half of mine inasmuch as I tend toward narcolepsy. I can go 10 hours easy, more if pressed. Mary, on the other hand, is often sleep-deprived inasmuch as she pays more attention than I. In a movie we saw recently, “Lady Bird,” the nun — a good one in this case — said that to love and to pay attention were, she thought, the same thing. Mary pays more attention, she loves more, which is why, I think, she has trouble sleeping.

The liberal judge Harry Pregerson’s last words were that he was sorry he could no longer help people. Mary is like that. Her example is clear. We must connect. Not because we want an enemy government to tilt the election toward us in return for . . . (we’ll have to wait for the answer to that one), but because it is simply the right thing to do. 

Connectedness without the con. That is life to her as it should be lived. That is her truth, and it is beautiful. And it is why, when it’s so easy these days to be distracted, she pays attention. 

First of all, I want to say thank you, Santa, and all your helpers for fanning out across the globe in these weeks leading up to Christmas to help keep the magic alive. It’s not easy being in so many places at once while also making your list and checking it twice. All those decked-out halls can get pretty noisy when the squeals of excited children are fueled by candy canes and sugar cookies. It’s enough to drive anyone to distraction.

The youngest children, and most ardent believers, can be reluctant to sit for a photo, and the older ones are growing ever more skeptical and less enchanted, doubting your very existence. There’s just a small window of time in which all the elements align and the little ones are filled with wonder and awe at the sight of you. 

It’s a tough racket, the Santa gig, so I don’t want to criticize, but I do have two basic pointers for those of you out there gallant enough to take on this job. 

It’s true that there are divergent opinions about some of the basics. Is Santa Claus a jolly old elf? And, if so, is he an unusually small man? Or is he an elf of human-size proportions? Or is he not an elf at all? While you ponder that one, let’s move on to what he knows and what he doesn’t. 

I think we can agree that he knows when you’ve been bad or good, but how exactly does he know? Does he have a crystal ball? Hidden cameras? Does he get texts from your parents? And if he knows when you’ve been sleeping and when you’re awake, shouldn’t he also know your name? I mean, it makes sense that he should know your name if he knows all those other things. 

So we arrive at tip number one: The real Santa knows the names of the children who visit him to tell him what they’d like for Christmas. The real Santa, and his helpers too, should probably not begin the conversation by asking a child’s name. 

And if he hasn’t been paying close enough attention to pick up the name during regular surveillance, does it really matter that Johnny stole his sister’s candy cane or Jill snuck some extra doughnuts to eat in bed after her parents tucked her in or Annie took their old iPhone to school without asking them? I’d argue it does, so let’s just get the names straight or find a way avoid the subject. 

Another tip, and this one comes from personal experience: While in full dress, Santa should not ask parents if they know who he is. And when they respond in the only prudent way, “You’re Santa,” he should not then press them to guess again and reveal his alternate identity while posing for a picture with their child. 

“Who’s Bob?” (I’m changing the name to protect the guilty.)

“Well, honey, Bob is one of Santa’s helpers, but don’t worry, he’ll get your list to Santa.” 

It’s a tangled web we parents weave at this time of year; we could all use a little magic to keep from getting caught in it. 

Carissa Katz is The Star’s managing editor.

For some forgotten reason, I receive “1600Daily” emails, which come from the White House and offer a spin on the news that contrasts totally with that of the information sources I more regularly rely on.

According to Tuesday’s “1600Daily,” President Trump wants us Americans to know that we have already gotten an early Christmas present, thanks to recent Republican legislation: The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed on Monday at a record high (24,290), because traders were, the bulletin said, “buoyed by news from over the weekend that Republican senators had voted to pass sweeping tax-reform legislation.”

Another early Christmas present for which we should be happy, as noted by the same “1600Daily” broadside, was the announcement by President Trump, on a visit to Salt Lake City, that he was radically shrinking the boundaries of the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments, which are home to countless Native-American historic and archaeological sites. Only the “smallest area compatible with the proper care and management” of the archaeological treasures would be preserved; these public lands were being sacrificed in order to “increase economic growth and prosperity, especially in rural communities, by allowing grazing, commercial fishing, logging, and in some cases, mineral development.”

Thank you, Santa! 

For some reason, though, those grinches over at the Sierra Club just won’t get into the holiday spirit. “Trump’s order represents energy interests that wouldn’t hesitate to start logging, drilling, fracking, or mining in these treasured lands,” read a press release from the Sierra Club, which also quoted a spokesman for the Navajo Nation, who put it this way: “They want to go after coal. They want to go after petroleum, uranium, potash. They want to clear all the timber.” 

I guess I am a Scrooge-like ingrate, too, because I cannot muster any feelings of thankfulness for the gift of commercial exploitation of our national monuments. I still love my country, and especially its wild places and wide-open spaces: “I love thy rocks and rills/Thy woods and templed hills,” as we used to sing in “My Country ’Tis of Thee,” back in elementary school.

I have been making my own lists, and checking them twice, and have been pondering what sort of Christmas present we should send to the jolly old man who occupies the White House. What do you think: a tax strike? Or another protest march?

There was a traffic jam on Tuesday morning on Main Street. A lone heron had found a happy roost on a Christmas tree stuck in the middle of Town Pond, and several drivers had stopped for a look.

I knew what was up in advance because my sister had phoned while I was getting a cup of coffee and left a voice message about a great blue heron atop the tree that has blue lights and that it would make the ultimate, if cheesy, Christmas photo for the cover of The Star.

By the time I got there about a half-hour later, Main Street was at a stop. Two people had pulled over on the James Lane side as well and were on the pond’s edge taking pictures with their phones.

When I got to the office and described the scene, Jane Bimson, one of our sales representatives and a good photographer, volunteered to get a photo. Taking a real camera with a lens that stood a chance of getting a decent shot, she headed out the door.

There have been plenty of herons around these days, it seems. The other morning, early, I had to slow my truck to give one that had been standing in the middle of Napeague Meadow Road a chance to rise and slowly fly off in a southerly direction, where a second heron launched itself from a tree and winged it off to do the same.

Earlier in the fall, a couple of people and I stood around in stunned awe looking across Folkstone Creek on Three Mile Harbor at several dozen herons that had paused to rest during migration. 

Herons have an interesting way of making a living, it seems to me. They are stone-cold killers, grim reapers of the swamps, whose strategy of stillness gives them an enigmatic air. Think of it: They stand for as long as it takes, knee-deep in water or amid a grassy meadow, then in an instant sweep down and grab a fish or other creature in their beaks.

At my friends Michael and John’s country place outside of San Francisco once, I watched a great blue hunting squirrels on the lawn. To my eastern eyes, accustomed to herons hunting fish, this seemed some kind of abomination. When I pointed it out, Michael told me they do it all the time.

 It’s hard to imagine that Town Pond, where the Christmas heron has taken up residence, has much for it to eat. A short flight away, Hook Pond is loaded with minnows, perch, and carp. Why this particular bird finds Town Pond appealing instead, I can’t say. Could be it’s bored and likes all the action. The view is fine, I’ll give it that. I hope it sticks around.

O’en, our cream-colored golden retriever who doesn’t retrieve, but who is as handsome as all get-out, has taken great strides forward.

Frankly, we had begun not to take Matty Posnick, ARF’s trainer, all that seriously when he would say not to worry, that O’en, who had until fairly recently treated training sessions as mixers requiring him to work the room, would come around. 

Mary’s thrown her back out a couple of times in trying to restrain him. He loves everyone equally and fervently, and is as strong as an ox.

A half-trained dog would have been all right with me, yet, as I say, he’s made great strides of late, to such an extent that we’re thinking that one day we might be able to put the leash aside, knowing he’ll be responsive to verbal commands. I see Bill Fleming’s golden retriever walking along beside him and, though usually I’m not, I’m envious.

I hadn’t been to training for a while, leaving that (among myriad other things) to Mary, and so even though she’d told me he’d improved markedly in the past couple of weeks, I was unprepared yesterday for what greeted my eyes in the Wainscott Farms greenhouse — an ever-attentive O’en, regal-looking as always, but also, wonderful to tell, utterly undistracted by all the distractions. 

There were at least a dozen dogs in the class, an intermediate one that O’en had had to repeat. One barked incessantly and a couple, German shepherds, were, frankly, a bit scary. But O’en was serene, staying, paws crossed idly in front of him, when he was asked to stay, fixing Mary with soulful stares when asked to “watch,” and coming neatly around to heel when Mary moved her left leg backward before clicking her heels together and lowering a treat.

Matty was right! All of a sudden, it had clicked. O’en knew the drill. 

Mary, who more than once in the past year had thought seriously, the steep fee notwithstanding, of sending him “to the monks,” is beside herself. 

As am I. As is O’en. As are all three of us.