Sometimes late at night, in bed, covers pulled up high, laptop on my lap, I open her emails. They’re saved in a folder marked A. The kids named her that, A. They don’t know about the emails, that I have them, that I read them.
j
writing a letter to mom which is turning into a teeny, tiny book with teeny, tiny chapters. I sob and laugh out loud. remember how patty always said things happened for a reason? she’d say she ran into ruby on the way to cvs, and then tell me it happened for a reason. it was a high probability event . . . ruby lived next door. then when she got a boot on her car, she seemed perplexed. i said to her, “now that happened for a reason!” anyway, i feel like a big boot is getting ready to clamp down on my life.
i love you,
a
j
my mom used to cut my french toast. when i was six, i burst into tears thinking i would never be able to cut my own french toast. i became fiercely independent ever after . . . until recently. i believe that someone has been metaphorically cutting my french toast for 10 years.
i love you,
a
j
i am still feeling really good. the fact that you said, “i can tell you are feeling better, you laughed an hour ago,” demonstrates that I still have a ways to go. to be with you and not laugh almost every second means that I am not of sound mind. i am better than okay in one regard. i haven’t contemplated death in 2 weeks. probably, because I haven’t been thinking about my future. unusual.
i love you,
a
I wore her sweater to the funeral, the one she gave me when it got too small for her, the one she said she’d take back when she got cancer, a joke she’d made a thousand times over the years when she gave me clothes that had become too tight.
I spent hours those last few months of her life finding health insurance for her. Sitting at a black metal bistro table on the coffee shop patio, I know how the summer sun felt on my skin as I absentmindedly broke off pieces of a scone, sipped my latte. I know the urgency I felt as I scrolled through limited insurance options. I know what it felt like to do everything with her, be everywhere with her—Athens, St. Thomas, The Keys, Michigan, the Outer Banks, home. I know what it’s like to search for pictures of her at a debutante ball in North Carolina in the 70s. What it feels like to see her name, printed in Wedgewood-blue lettering, in the program.
j
macaroni.
i’m working on the future.
yes, i’ll go to arizona.
a
Judith Shapiro is a writer who spends half the year on the opposite coast, confused about which way is north and marveling at the sun that sets on the horizon instead of rising. When the novel she’s writing looks the other way, she secretly writes anything else. A Pushcart Prize nominee, her work appears in The Citron Review, The New York Times, The Sun and elsewhere. See more at PeaceInEveryLeaf.com.