Who knew we would need a chemist last weekend, when I tried to make matzoh balls for our Passover seder? True, it was the first time I had hosted a seder in a very long time, but I had managed to find my mother’s recipe for matzoh balls, and there is nothing particularly daunting about making them.

    Unfortunately, things got a bit complicated.

    First, when I went to find my mother’s recipes and other Passover items — which had been stored away for years — I got a shock. Mouse dung and little seeds clung to the items in the storage drawer! The edges of a silk cloth and some of the Haggadahs and pamphlets had had their edges munched away.

    I forged ahead: I was looking forward to having a seder at home, and didn’t take this as a sign of trouble ahead.

    Matzoh balls are controversial. There are those who love them round and heavy, and those who complain that if they are too compact you have to eat them with a knife and fork. Some recipes call for letting the dough rest in the refrigerator for a while; others say that is a waste of time. I always liked them fluffy, the way my mother made them.

    Everything else about the meal went according to plan. I had set two days aside for getting the house, the table, and the food just right. Things were spinning along nicely until it came time to make the matzoh balls.

    Among the prized household items Chris brought along when we got married is a big copper bowl. Most knowledgeable cooks, especially those who bake, know that a copper bowl is best for whipping egg whites, especially when you chill it. (Chris had whipped a lot of them for soufflés in a former life.) Making matzoh balls is generally an easy process, once you’ve stopped arguing about what kind is best.

    One of my culinary achievements, if I say so myself, is good soup. A chicken soup for the meal had been under way all day, with an Iacono chicken purchased especially for it. The aromas were promising. Although some people cook their matzoh balls right in the soup they will be served in, I prefer boiling them separately in salted water.

    Waiting until every other part of the meal was almost ready, Chris and I got at it: I separated the eggs and he whisked the egg whites enthusiastically. I beat the yolks with a little salt, and we folded them into the whites once the whites were stiff. I had a big enameled pot with boiling water ready on the stove, and we started shaping the balls with a spoon and dropping them in.

    And then. And then? And then, as they cooked, they starting turning a distinct grayish green. If not exactly snow-white, matzoh balls are supposed to be at least in the realm of white. Ours looked like a science experiment. I tasted one and thought it was fine, if a little salty. Chris stood by, nonplused. Then, one of my sons, who had arrived for the seder, came into the kitchen, took a look, and pronounced them off the menu. What had gone wrong? A reaction between the copper bowl and the whites? Some sort of oxidation? Copper-polish poisoning?

    When it came time to serve the soup, I took an informal poll, but recused myself. The matzoh balls had to go, all agreed. The soup was good enough to stand on its own, thank goodness, although a few of those at the table, the hungrier ones, tossed in some pieces of plain matzoh for bulk.

    My granddaughter Evvy volunteered to ceremonially carry the gray matzoh balls one by one in a ladle to their respectable demise in the compost bin. On a night filled with traditional ritual, her matzoh-ball interment was something of a humorous and unexpected ritual. But one — unlike, say, the Four Questions — I hope we don’t have to repeat.

   My ex-husband came to Shelter Island to deliver the remainder of boxes I had stored in his basement, my former residence on the North Fork. “You have a lot of love letters in there,” he said. “Really?” I asked, surprised both by the information and the fact that he had apparently read the letters, which were not from him. I had been wondering what might be contained in the delivery that might be interesting, useful, or exciting, but did not consider love letters. Life is rarely anything similar to what I expect these days.

    Not just love notes, there were cards, drawings, and best of all, photographs of my various past lives. The interesting ’80s and ’90s hairstyles and outfits were pictured, along with every boyfriend I had in those two decades. I flipped through, flooded with memories such as a cruise to the Bahamas and trip to Las Vegas that my parents never knew I took. Now they will. Sorry, Mom and Dad. I am glad they survived raising four girls; it could not have been easy.

    Some of my relationship choices were considered mistakes by my family and friends. I admit that one or two were odd and even dangerous choices, but if I had not dated those that I did, I would have missed out on some amazing experiences. Many seem like a dream now. I would have never lived on Fire Island, barefoot on the beach for an entire spring and summer season. I wouldn’t have traveled to London and Amsterdam, or have spent six weeks in Key West. I would have never been part of Army life in Clarksville, Tenn.

    A few of the experiences were definitely not amazing in the euphoric sense, but were important in the grand scheme of life. They had to be. Take, for example, a terrorist attack with a resulting war that sent my husband to the Middle East, while I lived in the Hamptons opposed to the whole idea.

    I expected the trunk full of wedding memorabilia, but I didn’t know what to do with it. I put on the fancy wedding hat, looked at a few of the cards from friends and family, and was thankful to have an attic. “I’ll think about that tomorrow,” I told myself, one of my favorite Scarlett O’Hara lines.

    I did take the empty bottle of champagne from our first toast to the recycling center, a trip made to the soundtrack of Paul Simon’s “50 Ways to Leave Your Lover.” As I drove away from the dump, my iPod randomly landed on my wedding song. One of the men pictured in the box of memories always said that there was a “spiritual D.J.” that sends messages through the stereo. I believe it. He is an example of a guy nobody could understand why I dated.

    Over all, positive memories poured from the box, with kind words and professions of love, as well as a picture of a tattoo with my name. Maybe I do want some of that again. Seeing all of the boys in the box together, most of whom I thought were “the one,” confirmed the validity of destiny to me. There is not “one,” not for everyone, anyway. I was in love for a time, and so were they, according to the letters. When the relationships ended, it felt wrong and painful, but the pain went away, and if there were no ends, the others would have never wound up in the box.

    Carrie Ann Salvi is a reporter at The Star.

   What a long strange trip it’s been.  

   I’m talking, of course, about Mary’s uncanny success in The Press’s N.C.A.A. tournament pool.

    Although this is written before the final outcome is known, I think she’s already merited accolades. I told Cailin Riley, The Press’s sports editor, the other day that it was “the sports story of the week.”

    The fact is neither Mary nor I was eager to take part in March Madness inasmuch as neither of us knew what we were talking about. But don’t let that dissuade you, said my mother-in-law, who will bet on absolutely anything, and whose best results were achieved in her inaugural try, when she knew nada.

    With the deadline for submissions fast approaching, I ripped out the predictions of Newsday’s sportswriters and followed their advice down the line, including the upsets they’d forecast, and made out my bracket just to get it done and over with. Meanwhile, Mary deputized me to fill out hers also.

    I did, but later that day she called to say she was making some changes.

    Apparently, she was having second thoughts. And, as her suitable-for-framing final entry, replete with erasures, smudges, and X-ings out attests, she was having some third thoughts as well.

    This, I should add, is all well and good, for as the book on the brain I’m reading now says, our gut instincts are often wrong, and that it is only upon reflection that we can be said to be really thinking.

    In contrarian fashion, then, Mary went with the teams I hadn’t. And that was how she came to be at the top of the heap, bestriding numerous prostrate sports-savvy males, as Kentucky and Kansas prepared to meet in the championship game Monday night.

    “My father used to say that a $2 bet would get you off the fence mighty quick,” she says as we settle in for yet another televised roller-coaster ride.    And then, of course, there’s the head and the heart. Her heart said Chapel Hill and her head said Kansas in the quarterfinals, “though N.C. State was the key.”

    The downside to all of this is that I, an early casualty, have watched her undergo three — nay, four — meltdowns ending in utter despair in the past couple of weeks. On Sunday, I was left to keep vigil after she had, in her words, used her head (“Ohio State’s a better team than Kansas”) and had gone to bed.

    Around midnight, my partisan passions having been further inflamed by draughts of triple-distilled tequila (a birthday gift from my mother-in-law), I joyously took note that there was not a dry Buckeye eye to be seen throughout the Superdome and ran to give Mary the news that Kansas, which had trailed by as many as 13 points near the end of the first half, had come back to win 64-62, but she was sleeping the sleep of the blessed.

    What a long strange trip it’s been.

    What’s called a captain’s chair has been in the kitchen of the Rattray house in Amagansett since the 1960s. I’m not sure of the exact date it arrived, but I have never forgotten how it got there. My first husband and I had sailed over to Gardiner’s Island one summer’s day and gone ashore for a wander without being detected. The chair was in a small, tumbled-down building, exposed to the elements. I guess I must admit we pilfered it, yes, but at the time it seemed only right to save it from ruin.

    We owned a cruising catboat at the time (one of several we had over the years). They are centerboard boats with shallow draft and relatively broad cockpits. So it wasn’t particularly difficult to carry the chair aboard and take it home. Now, so many years later, I am amazed that it hardly shows any signs of wear. Visiting my son and his family, who live in the Amagansett house now, I couldn’t help but ponder how well built the chair was. It wasn’t new 50 years ago, and I don’t believe it has ever had to be repaired.

    Gardiner’s Island loomed large in our lives in those days, in part because the house is on Gardiner’s Bay and in part because the island’s future was uncertain. Robert David Lion Gardiner, who fancied himself as the Lord of the Manor, was the principal beneficiary of the trust that owned the island. He said contradictory things about what should happen to it. Because he had no heirs, his niece was in line to own the island, and, to thwart her, he went so far as to try to adopt a man named Gardiner from the South who may or may not have been a relative at all. It was all quite dramatic, and rather entertaining, too.

    One of my happiest memories of those summers long ago involves Gardiner’s Island, or to be more precise, Cartwright Shoal — a sort of sand archipelago that stretched into the bay from the south side of the sland — where we would go for picnics. We took a few friends there several times in a small Beetle catboat that we kept just offshore of the house. Beetles, which are raced in season on Georgica Pond, are uncommonly commodious and sturdy small boats. Ours was the only boat I was truly confident of sailing by myself. I remember the joy once of being at the tiller, heading back to shore with a grown man, his young son, and our big dog aboard.

    Cartwright was little more than a low stretch of sand with a lot of seagulls and a nice view; it used to come and go, disappearing under the water, depending on wind and weather. But I was shocked recently to learn that it is now totally gone. Storms and the rise of sea level have put it three to four feet under.

    There are other furnishings in the Amagansett house besides the Gardiner’s Island chair that I am sentimental about. There’s a heavy-duty hutch in the kitchen that we bought the year my son (who lives there now) was born. There’s an oil painting in questionable shape and in a simple black wood frame of a woman holding a bouquet of red and white flowers. An older generation had discarded it, and we needed something for the living room walls. There are lightweight chairs with remarkably short legs, and what may be a Dominy blanket chest that was badly refinished before we were given it. There’s a trypot, belonging to my late husband’s maternal ancestors, the Edwardses, which I believe was used to render the fat of whales caught off Amagansett.

    I am beginning to think it is time to put the history of these things down somewhere for the youngest generation. I was about to say put the history down on ink and paper, but that would have dated me.

    Time has flown. Sea level is rising. But family roots just grow longer.

   If you were told you only had one day left to live on this earth how would you spend it? It’s a question a friend of mine is writing a documentary about, and it got me thinking.

    I would have a helluva day and gather my favorite people around me to max out my credit cards doings all the fun things I haven’t been able to do for lack of money. I might even buy a few new outfits from my favorite expensive store in Montauk to wear for the last day, which I’m assuming would be a hot summer day.

    I would start this day by not brushing my hair. Even when I brush my hair it doesn’t looked brushed anyway, so why bother? I would set up a blanket and barbecue area on the beach at Ditch Plain and not wear sunscreen. We’d go way down to the west and sit under the crumbling cliffs to be away from Them. (Locals know who I mean by “Them.”)

    I’d swim, maybe even wearing a bikini, which I haven’t worn for years, because, really, who’s going to bad-mouth the cellulite on a woman who will disappear from the face of the earth at the end of the day? I’d eat as much junk food as I’d like, hot dogs, cheese doodles, chips, and chocolate bars. I’d drink beer, lots of it. And then I’d take a nap while the sun beats on my back. I’d even turn my face to the sun so I have a little color on my last day and not have to worry about wrinkles or skin cancer.

    We’d stay at the beach until sunset, and while everyone else goes home to shower, I’d go to church. I’d like to remind the good Lord of who I am. Although we talk every day, I don’t often go visit Him at His house and I think He needs to know what I look like these days. I wouldn’t have to tell Him all the good things I’ve done because like Santa and the Easter Bunny, He already knows if I’ve been bad or good. But I’ve been good, for goodness’ sake!

    On my last day I would stop saying hi to people who really don’t like to say hi back. You know, the ones who do everything they can to avoid you at the post office or the I.G.A. I don’t understand why some people do that since I’m not a big talker and am too busy myself to stop and chat. I’ve just been taught that it’s polite to say hello to someone you know, but if it’s that hard for others to reply they won’t have to worry about it anymore.

    When everyone else was showering for dinner, I wouldn’t bother. As I said earlier, my hair is pretty complicated so why waste time trying to tame it into submission on my last day? I’d pile it in a bun on the top of my head. As I write this, though, I’m realizing maybe I should just shave it all off. It’s not like I’d need it anymore.

    We’d go to my favorite Montauk restaurant overlooking the harbor and eat a broiled lobster that they cook like no other place in Montauk. We usually eat and run but since it’s my last meal I might linger a bit longer at the table and just keep eating. Once I filled up on the lobster I might go for an order of shrimp scampi, another item my favorite restaurant makes really well.

    Afterward, I’d pile my loved ones into my Jeep and we’d all head down to John’s Drive-In for a banana split or hot fudge sundae. Yum, this day is sounding better all the time.

    I just hope that when I do enter the garden gate that St. Peter will be there to meet me with my beloved grandparents and all the animals I’ve loved and owned. There’d be Jake, a chick magnet for my guy friends, who would borrow him because he was so weird looking that girls would stop to talk about him and pet his head. My cat Bauble would be there too. We almost lost Bauble on one of my first trips to Montauk when we had to go through Riverhead. We stopped for gas and the wily cat got out of the car in the middle of the traffic circle there. Many hours later we coaxed her back into the car and continued our journey to Montauk.

    Surely, Jack the Whack would be waiting to greet me as would Suzie, Muggs, Pugsley, Winnie, Patches, another Muggs, Kelly, Puffball, Ivy, Rosie, and many others. Maybe even our iguana, Nora Hewitt, named after my husband’s sister, would be slithering about.

    After this amazing day during which I would spend a lot of money on my credit card, I only have one concern. That I’d be resurrected! That might get me in a bit of trouble. But if all went as planned, it would totally be worth it.

    Janis Hewitt is a senior writer for The Star.

   Shellfish fans in the Town of East Hampton got a reminder this week of just how lucky we are — for now. The State Department of Environmental Conservation ordered a huge swath of Shinnecock Bay closed on Tuesday until further notice after the detection of a powerful biotoxin there.

    According to a press release, the D.E.C. found saxitoxin in mollusk samples from Weesuck and Penniman Creek in Southampton at levels that could lead to paralytic shellfish poisoning. The ban covers 3,900 acres. Some 90 acres in Mattituck Creek were closed after the biotoxin was detected on April 3.

    Saxitoxin is dangerous, and can cause death in untreated and extreme cases. It gets into filter-feeding shellfish during some algae blooms. And when certain predatory fish, crabs, and snails feed on contaminated clams, mussels, or oysters, they accumulate it, too, and it can climb the marine food chain. In 1985, 14 humpback whales that died during a five-week period off Cape Cod were found to have symptoms associated with saxitoxin.

    Algae blooms of the sort that carry saxitoxin and other harmful single-cell organisms may or may not always be linked to excess nutrients in road and septic waste runoff into surface waters. It appears to researchers that weather changes that lead to temperature and/or salinity spikes could play a role.

    Shinnecock Bay is no great distance from East Hampton’s surface waters. While residential and commercial development there exceeds that development here, conditions are similar in some places, so we cannot assume we are not also in danger of harmful blooms. Saxitoxin can be detected only in a lab, and the D.E.C., which has suffered deep budget cuts, is really the only line of defense.

    Semi-stagnation, for example, othe sort that could occur if Napeague Harbor’s east inlet remains closed this spring, could be a risk as well. Lake Montauk, which is under tremendous environmental stress and has low rates of tidal exchange at its southern reaches, might be another place the toxin could emerge, particularly as the climate warms. This is something that regulators need to take very seriously.

   I’ve always been fascinated with all things medieval so I’m just as surprised as anyone that I had never even heard of a Renaissance fair until I was at least 35 and never attended one until I was past 40. Growing up in New York City exposed me to all kinds of people from all walks of life, but I don’t remember a lot of them walking around in armor or wimples. But maybe I just wasn’t very observant.

    It was about six years ago in New Hampshire that I became aware that the Society for Creative Anachronism was taking over the huge Hopkinton fairgrounds for a weekend. Since it was just down the road a bit, I took the kids to have a look. I had no idea what it was, but the name implied that the members seemed to be able to poke fun at themselves.

    By that time I had met someone who made “Ren Faires” her second life, or possibly her primary one, and she took it very, very seriously. But that was not what I found with the S.C.A.

    A visit to the Web site will tell a reader, “The S.C.A. is an international organization dedicated to researching and recreating the arts and skills of pre-17th-century Europe. Our ‘Known World’ consists of 19 kingdoms, with over 30,000 members residing in countries around the world. Members, dressed in clothing of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, attend events which feature tournaments, royal courts, feasts, dancing, various classes and workshops, and more.”

    Although all of the people at the Hopkinton fairgrounds were in costume — or garb, as they call it — they wore watches. They answered cellphones. They smoked. In other words, they were being creatively anachronistic. Even though there was the occasional “What ho!” and “Good morrow” talk going on, it was said in a normal tone instead of a creepy fake British accent.

    One man in a tunic got out a pair of wooden swords and had a spirited duel with my then 6-year-old son. There was a staged battle to watch. There were vendors selling everything from period clothing to baby dragons to weaponry. There was a feast — smoked turkey drumsticks and bread rolls, I remember. Everyone was very friendly and wanted only to educate us on what they were doing to keep the Middle Ages alive. We expected to stay for an hour. We stayed for eight.

    But it wasn’t until this past summer when we watched the very funny movie “Role Models,” which features a teen­age dweeb who is obsessed with a re-enactment world called “Laire” with knights and elves and kings — that my son, Bingham Warner Lancelot Johnson (yes, that is his real name), turned to me and said, “Remember that sword fight in New Hampshire? Do they have something like that out here?”

    The answer is, they do. We have now been lucky enough to connect with the S.C.A.’s Suffolk County chapter, and on Saturday attended a “Spring Schola,” a medieval arts and sciences event in Centereach. It was focused on workshops, which were held on the subjects of spinning, weaving, belly dancing, archery equipment repair, and more, along with “a hearty day board,” faire talk for food. There were also introductory get-togethers for newcomers, like us, where we learned that we are now part of the Barony of An Dubhaigeainn, which is Celtic for “black abyss,” presumably what you would fall into if you were to continue past Montauk Point.

    Everyone in the S.C.A. has a group name and persona usually accompanied by a pretty detailed backstory. We newbies heard of an African-American member who likes to don Viking garb. His tale is that he was shipwrecked near a Viking encampment filled with blind Vikings, who raised him as one of their own.

    It may be a little over the top, but at least the members know and accept that, unlike some other festivals at which everyone just takes themselves way too seriously. On Saturday, young boys looked on in awe at the spears and swords grasped by men clad in leather doublets, girls admired the fine long-sleeved gowns and head attire worn by the ladies. Who cares if it was at an American Legion hall? We certainly didn’t.

    There is the upcoming “pennsic” in August, which we learned of this weekend. Apparently, this is the Cadillac of medieval re-enactments, held for a week in Pennsylvania with a cast of gabillions and several encampment sites. Since I don’t camp out no matter what the era, we may go and stay in a hotel, or “roadside tavern,” if you want to be cute about it.

    But for now, I doff my crown to the fine ladies and lords who leave their daily grind of work and families to create a sort of tangible magic for the rest of us. Chivalry is not dead. It’s alive in Suffolk County.

    Bridget LeRoy is a reporter for The East Hampton Star.

   The other night Mary realized she was missing the news.  “That’s good news,” I said, knowing that for her but to think is to be full of sorrow.

    (Keats said that by the way, not me, but I like it.)

    We are, as this is written, about to be transplanted temporarily in the ersatz environs of Palm Springs, where one of our daughters is to be wed. The weather ought to be good. Of course, it’s good here too, as it’s been all winter, inclining one to stay put, but at the end of the day filial ties win.

    In regretting an invitation to our college class’s 50th reunion recently, I said I rarely made it over the Shinnecock Canal anymore, and while that may have been a slight exaggeration it is true that I feel more and more at home at home. Bluebirds at the backyard feeders would make it perfect, but Bruce Horwith told me they prefer open areas such as you find around the airport and Napeague Meadow Road to the woods. We do have woodpeckers, though, goldfinches, flickers, nuthatches, and soon, I expect, irrepressible Carolina wrens that often nest in our flower boxes or in the outdoor shower.

    There are so many moles in the front yard that it would take a weapon of mass destruction to rid us of them, and so they, making themselves very much at home, continue to fluff things up. Walking on our mossy lawn is like walking on a lumpy mattress, a not unpleasant sensation.

    While I won’t be at the college reunion in body, I will be in spirit, in the form of a rather cheery essay on the passage of time. I should rail against it, but, for the moment, I can’t complain. And, as a result, I’ve begun to call myself the Pollyanna of the class of ’62. I told one of my college roommates that to remind me life was not all wine and roses I have a copy of Kafka’s short stories lying on my bedside table, and that, of course, I’d not yet read them.

   Out of the blue, our older daughter announced last week that she wanted a pig — sorely. This was not an ordinary pig, mind you, but some sort of supposed mini-breed she learned about on the Internet, which could be hers for $850, shipping from Indiana, or wherever, extra. I said no, of course, which set off a fit of wailing unprecedented for its length, if not for volume.

    My rationale against adding to our household in this way is simple: I don’t want any more responsibilities. When it comes to animals, the fact that I get up at least an hour before everyone else in our house means that I end up taking care of the three dogs: a pug, a small, curly-haired mixed breed, and a rangy Lab mix. Next it’s outside to the chicken coop to check the eight birds’ water and feed, and to open the door to their run.

    For whatever reason, it’s my job to pick up the poop in the yard, trim the dogs’ nails and the shaggy one’s coat, put the anti-tick stuff on them once a month, and so on. I collect and wash the eggs the hens produce and shovel their bedding a couple of times a year into the compost heap, which I drag over to the garden. Though I’ve managed to turn the garden, it has yet to be planted, and I have no idea what I am going to do to keep the deer out of it this year.

    The foregoing more or less was what I told the pig-wanting daughter, and her mother, who was somewhat sympathetic to her pleas. Moreover, it always had been understood that the middle child was the next member of the family in line to get her own pet. I had to draw the line.

    But the pig talk continued unabated. “I’ll take care of the pig!” our daughter howled. “You won’t have to do anything.”

    “I’ve heard that before,” I said.

    “I’ll prove it to you,” she said.

    So a couple of times this week, I have not had to feed the dogs. Lulu, the shaggy mutt (or, in other words, a Cavachon — half cavalier King Charles spaniel, half bichon frisé), has been given a bath that I did not have to initiate. The keening pleas have diminished somewhat.

    The answer about the pig is still no. But I worry that some members of the household may be plotting to move me out into a sty.

   Even though the “Mast-Head” this week is about the editor’s household and backyard pets (see below), I can’t help but get in a few words about how I wound up with a 23-pound cat named White Boots.

    About seven years ago, my oldest granddaughter, the pig-wanting girl in the “Mast-Head,” happened to be taken to the Animal Rescue Fund’s kennels for a special afternoon adventure on the occasion of her fourth birthday. That she might fall in love there with a kitten had not really been considered by her mother, who happens to be allergic to cats.

    Thus began my granddaughter’s first tearful campaign for a pet of her own. She begged her aunt to adopt the kitten for her, but that wasn’t practical: Her aunt was working in New York City and wasn’t often in her small apartment. She pleaded with her maternal grandmother, who lived in a Manhattan apartment and, well, didn’t know from cats. Then she got to me.

    I like to say I am more of a dog person than a cat person, but our family had had plenty of cats over the years, and I was between pets at the time. So, aware of what was in store, I went back to ARF with her to take a look. Although there was some question about whether he was the same kitten my granddaughter had fixed on originally, we chose a gray tabby with a luxurious white bib and tidy white boots. She gave the kitten the kind of name a 4-year-old might choose, White Boots, and she promised to visit all the time to take care of him. How could I say no? It not only meant a pet, but visits from a grandchild.

    As might have been expected, her cat-tending visits and interest waned. Besides, her parents had more to do than to make sure she kept her cat appointments. As time went by, she was treated to a dog of her own, the shaggy Cavachon mentioned in this week’s “Mast-Head.” And it was she, who will be 11 on her next birthday, who recently decided she wanted a pig.

    I had forgotten how old White Boots was until he started showing signs of indigestion and was taken to the vet this week. His age had been duly noted when he was neutered and information about him was still on file. That’s also how I learned what the formidable White Boots, the largest cat I’ve ever known, weighs. (I’ll resist the urge to insert a pig joke here.) A simple, over-the-counter remedy and a change of diet were prescribed. I have every reason to expect him to thrive. With all this talk of pets, though, I can’t stop thinking that it is time to get another dog.

    After my last dog, Goodie — named for colonial East Hampton’s reputed witch, Goodie Garlick — died, I decided that I couldn’t get another dog unless we put in an invisible fence, and I had qualms about those. Now, I’m beginning to think I might find a dog who wouldn’t mind spending some time by him or herself in a portion of the backyard that has a conventional fence. We do already have such a fence, but I’ve been afraid that a dog would howl in despair at being left there or would be able to dig out.

    As I imagine it now, I ought to have a dog that is neither too small nor too big. Although if someone offered me a Newfoundland, like the lovable Meg — the first canine of my adult life — I would have a hard time saying no. If anyone wants to take this as a hint, they’re welcome.