Today, I’m grateful for thirteen years with the best dog and best companion ever. I posted a pictorial timeline when he was six, including lots of puppy pictures, and concluded it with “May we celebrate at least as many more together.” My wish came true, my concerns for his health over the past few years notwithstanding. Truly, my whole day will be spent in joyful reflection on his long and happy life. It was fun to do a search here, and look back on pictures and stories about him over the past eight years.

I wrote that last paragraph after midnight, when I truly intended to devote the entire day to celebrating Stellar’s birthday, and also to gathering a timeline of more recent photos. The morning went as planned… and on our third walk of the day I filmed some clips, came home, and made a little movie of it. It was beautiful! I even had a professional soundtrack consultation lined up with KGMR, for whom I’ve been grateful for 22 years.

Then, and I’m grateful that this was the worst thing to happen in my little world today, iMovie threw a fit. “Stellar’s Third Birthday Walk” essentially vanished. After two hours building the movie, an hour troubleshooting on my own, and two hours on Apple support (for which I’m grateful), it was determined that the permanent fix will be to reset this new computer to factory settings after backing up all data, and start from scratch: recapitulating the past three weeks of laborious steps to get the old-to-new computer transfer to the point it was this morning, only this time, without the wrenches in the works. Sigh. I am so grateful for the equanimity that mindfulness practice has given me.

I didn’t let any of this ruin my day, or Stellar’s birthday. Through the whole of it, he continued to get his walks and treats and lovies, and he never knew the difference. He didn’t care in the first place. It was my trip to make his day special and make a movie and bake him a cake — to make his day special for me. The cake did get baked, late, and he enjoyed it. He’ll be nibbling on it for a couple of days.

Now, after dinner, and cake, and a good rub all over, he rests sweetly snoring on his bed between me and the couch. Fire mellows in the woodstove. Breath pours in, shoulders release, body reevaluates its position, relaxes, settles. Meditation. The big day comes to a close with both of us replete, despite its turn toward “unexpected product behavior.”

That’s what Caleb called it: He sees it “a lot, but that’s because troubleshooting is my job. But the user rarely sees this, it’s very, very uncommon for this problem to arise.” I’m grateful I’m now able to ask, Why not me? with a shrug, a breath, a smile, a flexible shift in course and perspective. I’ll remake the movie tomorrow. I’m grateful that I discovered this rare computer malady three weeks into its life rather than months and many intricacies, passwords, and gigabytes later. It could have been worse.

I’m grateful that Stellar woke up on his thirteenth birthday in good health and spirits, that I relaxed and patience allowed me to let the day unfold as it did instead of as I’d planned, and that aside from accomplishing little else, I paid my companion the attention he was due on his biggest birthday ever.