Though it’s hard to comprehend how we’ve reached this moment so quickly, the Girl is just shy of six feet tall and wrapping up her junior year of high school, and the Boy has crossed the five-foot barrier and will soon be twelve. The changes coming are enormous: L will be making final decisions about college over the summer, and the Boy will soon have a full-blown, empty-leg, teenage boy appetite.

We got a hint of that this evening.

After eating a full meal, he came back downstairs hunting for food no more than five minutes later.

“I’m still hungry,” he declared. So he got a piece of yesterday’s leftover pizza out and warmed it up.

Clover smelled it, sensed a treat, and followed him into Papa’s room (it will always be “Papa’s room”), and sat down like the best behaved pup in the world.