this message brought to you by comet and hilde. nicholas is walking them today, mary said i can stay home next week, and beyond, and i'm really touched by this. she said as long as i get paid, you get paid, even though i never expected job security, and wondered if the pandemic would mean people walking their own dogs. and i want to continue walking, i don't want to shelter in place, and i think i will tell her that as long as possible i'd prefer to keep working. i think back to my long grim tenure in the corporate law firm when i daily said in my head for 8 years i prefer not like a silent mantra until one day i finally said it aloud and descended the elevator on angels' wings and when i reached street level i could have kissed the concrete and it seemed that all the skirts were ballooning and dancing in the wind and i sighed out all the zeroxed recycled stale ceo air and floated away. i might say i'm still floating on the ground today.