Nancy’s husband sent a picture two days before she died. In that one, she wore a white sleeveless nightgown. Her grown sons leaned over either side of her, a hospice tray with a cup of applesauce in the foreground. She was sleeping. Perhaps she’d slipped into the...
This happened before the election, when I wasn’t so worried about the country. My daughter and son-in-law claimed they still have only a three-year old girl and a six-year old boy, but they lied. They suddenly have nine kids, maybe more. I know this because my...
I have spent all morning lying in the sunshine on the floor with Hannah the Lab, knowing it’s our last morning together. She can’t get to her feet by herself anymore. It came on fairly suddenly last week, this final diminishment. My husband and I can...
I haven’t done a blog post in a long time, and a few people have been kind to mention that they’ve missed them. It’s not that I’ve forgotten. Life has interfered with my getting much work done. During late summer we had some minor (ha!) renovations done to our...
Lately I have sounded a lot like my father in his last years, when he was in his nineties. I breathe heavily when I move. Rising from a chair requires grunting with exertion. Then there’ll be a series of thuds as I grab the handles of a walker and bump my way...