Dancing Brave

Pea Soup I Don't Hate

My mother-in-law is visiting this weekend, which has been fun -- she's very relaxing company, much like her son, so there's none of that stereotypical Monster-In-Law nonsense where she comes in and says, like, "Your hair is looking nice, considering," or, "Your house is much cleaner than I expected," or, "Kevin looks skinny -- does he not like your cooking?" Instead, I love her. She's so warm and nice. I scored in that respect.

And so, since we're taking her out to dinner for Mother's Day, I decided to cook last night. Kevin grilled on her first night here and all I had to do was steam some cauliflower, so this was my turn. For Christmas, Dad made up a little binder of some of his favorite recipes and kitchen tricks -- including three recipes for creamed spinach of varying degrees of difficulty, including "Creamed Spinach: Delicious," which reads solely, "Go to Fleming's [a steakhouse chain they love] and order some." Contained therein is a recipe he calls Smelly London Fog but which we usually refer to by its more literal title, "Cod In Pea Soup." That's what I made.

Now, I know how weird that sounds. The first time I heard about it, I envisioned whole peas and bits of fish floating around in a broth, and I gagged, because a) I don't even like peas, so the entire idea of pea soup -- especially once you slap a piece of fish into it -- sounds like fresh, green hell to me, and b) I generally hate fish, although cod and its ilk are usually fine because they don't taste like what they are. This is more like a fried piece of love in a creamy puree, the kind of meal you need more bread to enjoy because bending down and scraping your tongue against the plate isn't encouraged in polite society. Essentially, the soup is (or can be) so thick and creamy it could almost work as a dip with toasted baguette slices, and you plop a piece of breaded white fish into the middle. I almost wanted to photograph it, but I am no Grant or Carol; however, this was one of the few times where I got the plating just right, as opposed to my usual "Looks Like Crap But Tastes Good" approach to serving food, so I probably should have indulged the whim.

Here's what you do: Bring a pint of chicken stock to a boil and then -- according to my Dad's recipe -- "bung in a packet of frozen peas." When they're tender, take them off the heat and run them through a food processor. I do this in batches, by spooning out the peas bit by bit first, then slowly adding the liquid and letting the Cuisinart whir until it's relatively smooth. My Dad's recipe continues, "Because this will not work, you should then run it through a fine mesh strainer, pressing the mushy bits with the back of a ladel or whatever's handy, just to make sure all the good stuff is squeezed out." I had relative success with my Cuisinart, though. It was smooth enough; I like a bit of texture in this dish, but even so, this was fairly successfully pureed, so I skipped the strainer step and put it all straight back into the pot. Bring that to a boil, and add "as much heavy cream as you fancy" -- for me, maybe half a small carton? -- and an indeterminate amount of sherry (my Dad is apparently the Rachael Ray of our house). I can't even quantify how much I put in; I just poured a little in there, and since "a little salt and pepper wouldn't go amiss," I threw some of that in too and stirred it up, and then kept it simmering until everything else was ready.

I sprinkled some sesame seeds onto the baking sheet that goes with my toaster oven and prepared to toast them -- if you do this step, either do it way in advance or do it right at the end because they only take a minute or a minute and a half. Also, watch them, because they go from blonde to black in almost no time. We went through four tries before they were golden brown. Start small and keep toasting in tiny increments (you could do this in your oven, too, obviously) until you catch them right when they're caramel-colored. It's hard. Kevin had to devote almost all his energies just to completing this step. There was much cursing. If you do multiple attempts, like we did, remember that the hot pan contributes to them toasting even faster each successive time. It took us two batches to realize that.

Anyway: I dredged three 5-ounce pieces of halibut (cod or sea bass, or any flaky white fish, would work too and the recipe originally DOES call for cod, but they all are delicious with it) in egg wash, flour, egg wash again, and then breadcrumbs. I heated a bit of oil in a pan that I spritzed with Pam for good measure, then fried the fish for about seven minutes total, with the soup still simmering next to it. To plate, I spooned the soup into a shallow pasta bowl, placed the fish on top of it, sprinkled some toasted sesame seeds, and then added a drizzle of sesame oil because the recipe promised me it would "look like you really know what you're doing."

DELISH. If you're still sitting there feeling skeptical, trust me, I know where you're coming from, but you're wrong. I can't impress upon you how much I hate all the green vegetables that are the best for me (broccoli, peas, etc), and yet this dish is GOOD. It's also really hard to screw up, because you can just add more cream and a drizzle more sesame oil and nobody will notice anything else. But boiling the peas in chicken stock gives them a nice richness of flavor that is far less gross than I imagine when I envision eating a spoonful of them in their regular form. Now, if only someone would discover that cream is magically heart-healthy and not at all fattening, I would eat this all the time.

We also played some Scrabble, went to the Getty, and watched The Departed. I thought it was only okay -- without spoiling it for those who haven't seen it, some of the cat-and-mouse stuff was all right, but I thought the storyline with the girl was kind of dumb, was a bit bored by what I felt was lazy dialogue (it felt like, "When in doubt, use the c-word, or the f-word, or better, BOTH!"), and got distracted by the bits on which the story hangs that involve really unrealistic text-messaging during times of crisis. I mean, I'm pretty sure that Jack Nicholson would NOTICE that the dude in his backseat is shifty-eyed and punching words into his phone when he's not supposed to be. I also thought Jack Nicholson was sort of terrible. I know he was a good actor in his day -- I've seen Chinatown and One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, so I get that Jack Of Yore had skills -- but that doesn't mean I have to like him NOW. It doesn't give him a pass, so I have to admit it: I'm sick of his schtick, and "schtick" is really what it's starting to feel like. He's approaching Pacino levels of intolerable for me. Okay, not QUITE that bad -- I REALLY think Pacino is drastically overrated at this point in his career -- but seriously, I was never able to buy the menace in Nicholson's character because half the time his scenes were so overplayed. And the last shot of the movie was a tiny bit on-the-nose for me. I didn't hate it, definitely didn't love it, don't really need to see it again, and got bored when we hit the two-hour mark and it was still going.

Of course, I freely admit I am not the arbiter of taste when it comes to movies. More and more, I like to be idly amused or emotionally engaged in a weepy way, maybe even both at once, so this kind of film is almost never going to satisfy me completely, although I did WANT to like it. Oh well. So that we have full disclosure, I almost cried at P.S. I Love You when I saw it on a plane -- although I know it's not a good movie either, the soundtrack is great, and all I could do was sit there and think how totally screwed and depressed and inconsolable and inert I would be if anything tragic happens to Kevin. Hence, the tears. But the fact remains I was, at least on some level, more moved by that than I was by The Departed. You may revoke my membership to the human race now, if you like. I guess right now, for whatever reason, I don't dig Films With A Capital F as much as I do regular old movies. So while y'all are partaking in Things Of Quality, I will be watching Center Stage reruns on Oxygen while I slather myself in pea soup.

Project Pony: #3

Meet Bubbles and Seashell.

I didn't get these two at the same time, but I believe it was one after the other -- Bubbles up there on the left (as if you couldn't guess by her rump) came first, followed by Seashell, who I think arrived in my Easter basket one year. My mother rocked.

These ponies always seemed so cute to me, because they were sitting down all beseechingly and had the white diamond on their faces. Every horse I ever drew at that age -- and there were a LOT; later on, in my fifth grade class, we had to create a comic strip and mine was about a horse named Garfunkel, and for the record, it was AWFUL, because I can't draw or write jokes -- had either a white diamond or a white strip down its nose.

But as my pony collection expanded and I started deciding to pair them off romantically, I gender-changed one of these ponies so they could be a couple. I can't remember which one, but I believe I made Bubbles the doddering old stallion and Seashell was the mare. And yes, I also made them old-fogey horses, which is totally unfair and probably stemmed from how they were sitting down, because CLEARLY, only OLD THINGS sit down all the time. So they became the sages of the neighborhood.

It occurs to me that in all this time I played with My Little Pony toys, I never actually NAMED the neighborhood. What an oversight.

9021ugh

All the rumors about Jennie Garth joining the cast of the 90210 spinoff are starting to perturb me, for one very specific reason: They all have her teaching fashion design at the high school. Which is great, except for how DONNA was the one who designed clothes, and Kelly Taylor was the one who did Donna's P.R. for a brief time and worked at random free clinics and judged gay couples for wanting to adopt children.

If they had a class on Giving Disdainful Looks with a minor in using them on people you are judging after a 10-second encounter, Kelly could teach it. If the school offers a seminar on getting sucked into a college cult, or choosing yourself, or overcoming a series of bad haircuts, then I'd fully support Kelly Taylor taking on the role of instructor. But fashion design was NEVER what she did. It makes no sense. Hopefully Jennie Garth is pointing that out to them now, rather than snapping up the job and figuring they'll fix it all later.

Also, you can't bring her Kelly without Dylan. They were supposed to end up together, per the series finale, and I just don't want to deal with some cockamamie fake story about their breakup unless it involves the return of Brenda and one final -- or, better, first-of-many-new-ones -- catfight.

Clearly what they need to do is have Andrea Zuckerman be the new Gil Meyers -- the cool English teacher who supervises the Blaze and befriends a few students and generally blurs the lines of propriety a little before ending up Their Faculty Buddy. Or she could be the new Mrs. Teasley, although given their disciplinary history, I think Steve Sanders returning to take on that job would be way funnier.

Egypt Travelogue: Day 1: Getting There

My first impression of Egypt was that it was blurry.

Of course, that's just because I was bleary-eyed and exhausted from the flights; we went from LAX to Heathrow to Cairo, with a 2.5-hour layover in between. Even Beijing wasn't that much travel -- 12 hours, direct, on Air China. So it was a lot of sitting, but when it ended, I was at my final destination. Heathrow was 10 hours away and Cairo another four-and-a-half. At least the British Airways flights had those seat monitors so we could watch whatever movies we chose:When I wasn't gossiping with Jessica, I whiled away the hours with Enchanted and, eventually, National Treasure: Book of SEEEEECRETS (you must utter it with a raspy, melodramatic tone), as well as most of the five magazines I packed and part of one of the six books. Like Jess, I have a pathological fear of running out of amusements on flights. It could've been worse: I left the house with eight books but decided to "be good" and leave two behind in the car. I have problems. But, SPOILER, I did end up arriving back home at the end of the trip having read all but two of the books and every magazine plus the Heat I purchased in Heathrow.

The big drama is that we had to fly into Terminal 5 -- our LAX flight landed there, but we transferred to Terminal 4 to catch the plane to Cairo. And about a week and a half before we left Los Angeles, British Airways opened T5 to much fanfare and disastrous baggage-handling problems that stranded or permanently lost thousands and thousands of suitcases. We joked about losing our bags, exacerbated by arriving at LAX and checking in, only to have the dude put "TRANSFER: TERMINAL 1" tags on our luggage because "we're out of all the T4 ones." We all opened our mouths to say something and then noticed the weary expression on his face that seemed to say, "I know what's coming, and I have had to give this answer a thousand times in the last week," so we just gave it up to the fates and prayed the Heathrow people would figure it out. Ultimately all three of us packed carry-on bags full of tiny toiletry essentials and as many clothes as we could fit, though, because the last thing we wanted was to get stranded in a hot climate and a culture that demands more conservative dress and good walking shoes, and find ourselves without an ample supply of those things. Bloody good thing: When we landed in Cairo on Wednesday just before midnight after about 18 hours of travel, Kevin's duffel bag -- into which we'd stuffed spare sneakers, big bottles of sunscreen, Luna bars, an extra hat, and overflow clothes in case we got sweaty and needed to change a few times a day -- wasn't on the baggage belt.

Side note: More thoughts on Terminal 5 later, but because of the suddenness of the flight cancellations and how it stalled BA's full switch to T5, they have a coach route between terminals that takes forever. Seriously, we spent 20 minutes on an overcrowded bus going over and under and around and through all these weird parts of the airport, with random tunnels and an up-close view of planes being restocked and refueled... if I'd been more awake I'd have wondered if this was the part where we were all killed so we couldn't complain about the future whereabouts of our luggage. But more to the point: Even though most flight ops will be from T5, why wouldn't they plan some kind of monorail to other terminals? $4.3 billion pounds and they couldn't drop a couple extra pence in the coffers for a shuttle? Please.

Back to Cairo: Fortunately we'd shelled out for a driver from the Nile Hilton to pick us up, and he helped Kevin convey all the lost luggage information to the right people. Since they kept trying to convince us the bag was somewhere on the belt despite it being empty, the smart money had that suitcase never finding us in Egypt.

The Cairo airport was a crowded nightmare, so having a driver helped immensely. You have to buy an entry visa, but you get it AT the airport before you go through to claim your bags. Lines are long and seemingly random, but the guide meant he could get someone's attention faster, get our paperwork, get our passports stamped, and get us through by circumventing the queues. Imagining having to negotiate that throng of humanity -- and dim lighting -- in the wee hours and on very little sleep, without ANY kind of aid, made my eyes cross.

But finally we were away, sailing through the then-empty streets, past statues and mosque minarets and the occasional billboard (my favorite: a Dorito with a hairy wig). It's always hard to drink in a city on a cab ride from the airport, but our tired eyes were still hungry. We were just so anxious to dive right in and get a feel for Cairo.

When picking our hotel, we went for a combination of location and reviews and moderate price, and we totally hit the jackpot. The Nile Hilton is in downtown Cairo alongside the famous river, right next to the Egyptian Museum and by a subway stop. We were on the same side of town as the Khan-el-Khalili bazaar, Coptic Cairo, the Citadel and other famous mosques; Giza and the pyramids were across the water. And that worked out to be our best decision, in terms of enjoying restaurants and playing our days fast and loose in terms of what we saw when.

It also had a great pool and a rooftop bar, which never hurts.

The one thing we'd read is that the Nile Hilton, one of the first major hotels to be built in Cairo, could use a renovation. And that's sort of true. While the cooling lobby was all fresh marble and ATMs and a deli and some shops, the rooms were a little more rustic. Totally clean, comfortable beds, beautiful Nile views, but fairly basic decor and even some awesome old furniture. When we entered, there was a wooden lattice frame that half-blocked the bedroom from the closet/foyer and bathroom (here, in Jess's room; mine and Kevin's was the mirror image), and one nightstand had channel-changing dials and volume knobs that, in the days of yore, would've controlled the TV, which you can sort of see in Jess's room in this shot. But I wouldn't have changed it for anything. There was something awesomely retro about it, and it wasn't run-down or disheveled. Just not state-of-the-art. And in an era where everyone seems to want to become a hip boutique hotel with minimalist decor that's never actually comfortable, I appreciate that the room felt homey even though it didn't feel new.

Because of the heat, we'd sworn we'd get an early start most days. But this being our first day, we let ourselves "sleep in" and planned to meet at nine to kick off our sightseeing. Even at this late -- or early? -- hour, there was music and chatter wafting up to our seventh-floor balcony, just enough to give us a feel for the rhythm of the city but not enough to keep us from conking out as soon as we switched off the lamp. Cairo would have to wait.

But just for seven hours.

To Be (Limp, and Live) Or Not To Be

I consider it my duty to let you know what they're doing on Passions in the waning months of its life -- and if you thought the stuff they've done before was insane, well, hang onto your pants. It seems the latest serial killer in Harmony, who has been murdering her older sister's lovers, recently CASTRATED Julian Crane. And they called in Dr. Eve to sew it back on, and it backfired that she's the only doctor in town because she was hammered but she did it anyway... and REATTACHED IT BACKWARDS.

Now, I'm not sure what that means. But Dr. Eve just told him, "You can be limp and live, or you can have one last erection... AND DIE," so I can vividly imagine what it MIGHT be.

You know what? Let me just transcribe the entire scene I just watched.

JULIAN, a crotchety 50-something, lies in a hospital bed chewing on his blanket in a wide-eyed infantile panic. DR. EVE, his hot physician, stands over the bed while a scantily clad ESME, his bit-of-stuff, watches.

EVE: All right, Julian. I mean it! I don't want you to do or think anything that might arouse you.

JULIAN (trembling): What am I supposed to do? Lapse into a coma?

EVE: Just think pure thoughts.

JULIAN: First time for everything, I suppose.

EVE: Read a book!

JULIAN: Oh, yes. I could begin with Thomas Jefferson's biography, especially the part [growls] where he GETS IT ON with Sally Hemings.

EVE:OK, Julian, then just watch TV.

JULIAN: Yes, there's the Weather Channel and its talk of HEAT lightning and storm SURGES.

[ESME shivers excitedly]

EVE: Meditation, then Julian, okay? Just don't think about sex or women or anything titllilating.

JULIAN: You had to use the word 'TIT'tillating?

[Eve hands him a stack of "safe" magazines]

JULIAN: Global Business, Field and Forest. Why not a National Geographic? Then I could look at pictures of those top-heavy indigenous women dancing themselves into ORGIASTIC ECSTASY.

EVE: There is nothing sexual in either of those magazines.

JULIAN: Or INTERESTING.

EVE: Okay, so you'll have to be dull for a little while longer!

JULIAN: No matter how brief the time before my next surgery, it'll seem like an eternity if I'm relegated to reading this tripe.

EVE: Okay, well then, I guess there's a choice. You can be limp and live, or you can have one last erection and DIE. Doesn't seem like a very difficult decision to me.

JULIAN: WELL PERHAPS NOT FOR YOU.

[JULIAN opens Field and Forest to a page with a large swordfish on it]

JULIAN: God, look how BIG that is... [puts it aside in anguish] Oh, dammit, that's what they used to say about ME.

We then get a fantasy in which he's in his hospital gown, fishing off his bed with a long fishing pole between his legs. Rebecca -- one of his former cavorting pals on the show -- appears dressed as a mermaid and purrs that she loves a man with a big rod, and then Eve and Esme show up dressed as fishermen and we get lines like "Hold her down while I get ready to pierce her with my harpoon!" and "Surf's up. SO TO SPEAK." But, brilliantly, when the fantasy ends the music cue is all, "Waaaaah," like a comical going-limp noise, and Julian frets, "It's going to be harder than I thought not to be... HARD."

Then LATER, he surfs the channels to find stuff that will calm him down and comes upon a war documentary and goes, "That is the biggest cannon I've ever seen. Can you imagine the size of its... PAYLOAD?"

I mean... tell me this show isn't totally brilliant. You can't! It's deranged GLORY.

Egypt is a three-letter word. Well, two letters, technically.

Wow. Just wow.

The whole time we were in Egypt, we uttered the same string of adjectives: unbelievable, amazing, lovely, incredible, over and over again. But when our tour guide in Luxor teased us that the Americans he's ever shown around (which, interestingly, included a delegation of 30 U.S. politicians at one point) all end up gushing the same thing, and that is, "Wow." He said it was a compliment, saying that it always comes out really effusive and expressive and delighted, and that he loves it as a sign of how enraptured we are and that he's found Americans are always the most fun that way. I have to say that for us it was true despite the fact that it's just two measly letters made into an "o" sandwich. We put a lot of oomph into our wows, and really, it's the best word to describe everything we saw and did. A relatively deserted camel ride around the pyramids! A hot-air balloon ride over Luxor! Tombs of pharaohs! A sunset felucca (small boat) trip down the Nile! Museums and temples from 3500 years ago! Delicious food! It was mind-blowing.

Photos and details to come; I'm just catching up on work and sleep in the meantime. But... well, wow.

Eastward Ho

Man, it's been all death and ponies up in here, huh? And now I'm pissing off for a week to check out Egypt. At least there should be some good travelogue stuff to write about when I get home, but I hate feeling like I've neglected this space except to drop in and wax maudlin about funerals. Fortunately that's where I get to be bossy about it being MY blog, and also, getting to write about it was a pretty nice way to channel my grief. Bless you, blog.

I will leave you with these thoughts:

1. Why am I watching The Bachelor? Is it really just because he's British, and therefore seems more charming than sleazy because of his accent? And why do I like him in spite of his predictable insistence on keeping immature blond actress and Lorenzo Lamas spawn Shayne around? WHY?

2. When will they get rid of man-faced Lindsay on One Tree Hill, already? HURRY UP. Give all her air time to the adorable Jamie. He's four and he's more interesting.

3. Why am I looking at a stack of seven books to bring with me to Egypt? I know I am terrified of running out of reading material, but that's excessive even so, because there is a stack of twelve magazines sitting right next to it.

4. Why have I saved all the Eli Stone episodes even though I have been unable, on repeated attempts, to warm up to the show? Can I not just hit DELETE ALL and be done with it? I blame Loretta Devine. Somehow, and it's probably tied to Boston Public even though I didn't really watch it, she makes every show feel like it's by David E. Kelley and I can't cope with that. Not that I don't also kind of love her, though, because I do. It's a confusing time.

5. There isn't a fifth thing. Have an awesome week!

A Woman Well-Loved

Thanks so much for all the wonderful good wishes for me and my family. I'd just written this long post about my grandmother, and the funeral and the viewing, but my computer ate it. A post about death died a very sudden one.

The viewing was as odd as they usually are -- there's something spooky in the sight of a body lying lifeless in its coffin, looking as serene as an afternoon nap. My grandmother wore that familiar brooch from her 90th birthday, a blue shirt that would've matched her now-closed eyes, and carried a rosary whose beads spilled over her folded hands. Watching my mother and her sisters kneel together in front of the coffin, shoulder-to-shoulder and arm-in-arm as they said their final goodbyes, moved me profoundly. Intellectually, it's easy to understand that the ties that bind them and Grammie are the same that bind my sisters and me and Mom. But because we've always known them as The Adults, you forget that they're trading on a shared six-decade history of being children and siblings, saying farewells to a woman who adored them so faithfully all that time. "Losing someone who loves you unconditionally, and without question, always leaves a void," Mom mused to me later. "I don't know if that will ever go away."

Still, all I could do was smile when I went up to say goodbye and wish her peace. She was Grammie, but she wasn't, not any more. And while it could have been very easy to give myself over to how much that can hurt, I just... didn't. She looked like she'd drifted off in the middle of a wonderful dream, and in my mind that's exactly how it happened -- Grammie took her leave of this world with the same grace with which she inhabited it, looking as radiant as a person can be in their coffin, resting so gently you almost expected her to wake up and ask what she'd missed. Mourners who knew her still gasped in awe at the assembled photos of her in a school uniform, in her wedding dress, in the familiar sweater and slacks of her later years, and lauded her remarkable beauty. My mother gently stroked the lid of the coffin and remembered my grandfather making all the arrangements for their final rest. "He was very concerned with how the inside would be," Mom grinned. "She picked the coffins and he insisted on taking care of the rest, because he said he wanted her to be comfortable. 'She HAS to be comfortable,' he told me, and so he tweaked their plans over and over until he was completely sure."

Even the funeral felt a little like a bunch of hoo-ha for someone else. Intellectually I knew it was her body in the coffin I escorted up the church aisle -- I was a pallbearer, along with Kevin, Dad, Julie, and my uncle and a cousin -- but throughout it felt more symbolic than actual. The priest knew her, told some stories, remembered how Grammie would sit to the right of the altar so she could stare across at the stained-glass window that had looked so familiar to her when she first attended Mass in Naples -- and which she later realized was the same marvel that graced her high-school chapel in Ohio. It was a personal service, a lovely one, but because it felt like it honored her spirit rather than her actual body lying prone inside a box, somehow the emotion of it didn't overwhelm me into sobs. It felt more like a bittersweet hug. We loved her, but we were letting her go, and she was off someplace she fervently believed in, and which she was certain would reunite her with her husband.

Twice, I did cry. My mother sings every hymn at every Mass in top voice, her gorgeous, lilting soprano gently caressing every note. As we sang the last hymn, we recessed into the vestibule and waited there until the song ran out of words. On the last couplet, I looked at my mother, singing her heart out until she chanced a glance at the coffin. Her voice cracked, faltered. She stopped, bowed her head, and rested it in her palm for a split-second before shaking it and rising again with a shrug and a wet smile. My mom always finishes the song, but here, she couldn't. Her emotion swallowed her whole, and it got me, too.

The second time, we were at the mausoleum. As the mechanism raised Grammie's coffin to meet the mouth of her tomb, my mother peered in and saw the shining edge of Gramp's tucked away in the back and gave a little wave and blew a kiss. Then in Grammie went, and the old man -- working his last day on the job before retirement -- caulked the opening, closed it, and sealed it with the marble plaque that bore Gramp's name, Grammie's, and the dates of their births and deaths. Seeing a bookend on my grandmother's life brought out my tears at last. That final date, a visual reminder of The End, means more than just one chapter has closed. It meant no more visits to Naples, no more Christmases, no more hearing her easy laugh.

But as my mom noted, there was no tragedy here. She was not the younger person whose wake took place down the hall, and she didn't fall on the wrong side of a prognosis's odds; she was not the baby entombed a few spots away. This was a woman who gave the world 96 years and then left exactly the way she wanted to go. As death goes, this was a blessing. And that's why we allowed ourselves to enjoy each other, to tell some stories about her, and Gramp, and their wicked sense of humor -- like the time a groomsman showed up to Alison's wedding apologizing for not getting his shaggy hair cut, at which my grandmother innocently smiled and said, "Well, I have my needlepoint scissors in my purse" -- and to make the weekend as much about love as we could.

In fact, my mother said it best. As we raised our glasses at dinner the night after the funeral, she said, "To a life well-lived, and a woman well-loved." We clinked. We cried. We smiled. Amen.

Love and Death

When I was thirteen or fourteen, my grandmother got cancer. The details sort of escaped me, partly because I was a teenager and totally involved in my own drama, partly because I'm sure because my mother sugar-coated Grammie's ordeal either for our sanity or for her own, and in part because even at 80 my grandmother seemed indomitable. She was petite and soft-spoken, but she was forever.

I hate that I can't remember much about what this was like for her. But I do know that chemo helped, and she beat it; the loss here was that bit by bit, her beautiful red curls fell out and turned to white-gray wisps clinging desperately to the pink skin on her skull. Self-consciously, she would wear those little stretchy turban caps on her head when we came to visit. But one night, as we sat around the dining table, the occasional gentle rubbing and itching around the cap became regular scratching. My mother gently put her hand on Grammie's arm and said, "You're uncomfortable. Why don't you take it off? It's okay." Wearily, shakily, Grammie slid it off, freeing her skull to the air but laying herself bare. Even in front of family, it was a big step. Her lips formed a tiny smile but she sat there, hands fidgeting, eyes flickering around the table. We started in on some light chatter until my grandfather's voice broke through ours.

"You know what, Evie?" he said. "You have the most beautifully shaped head I have ever seen. It's exquisite."

Grammie giggled. Then beamed. Then completely relaxed into her seat, into the conversation, into her family, as my grandfather smiled at her with limitless adoration and awe.

I've remembered that moment ever since. That moment is love. That moment, and a million others like them in her long life, carried my grandmother through the ten years she outlived her husband. "If I could do it all over again, I'd marry Evie," he was fond of saying. She was never alone after he died; she had us, but more importantly, she still had him, and he was part of her until she drew her last breath.

It's been surreal, waiting for The Call since more than a year ago -- back when she wasn't supposed to make it more than six months at best. My grandmother, all 5-foot-one of her, may have looked fragile but she had the soul of a fighter. She was brave and graceful when her body stopped being able to keep up with her still-sharp mind, when the trappings of age sapped her energy.  There was no getting better, there was only waiting. I can't imagine the kind of courage it takes to close your eyes every night, or for a nap, and not know if you'll open them again or if the disease will take you while you dream. She had no fear. She was ready. And she had humor. Her 98-year old sister still lives; in the last few months Grammie would crack wise, "I don't know WHAT she's still hanging around for at this point." Last year, at age 95, she announced she didn't want to use a cane because "canes are for old people."

So it's weird to think she's gone. When we lost Gramp, it was sudden, and we didn't know he wouldn't be able to get better. He went into the hospital not feeling well and died within a week. Exacerbating the grief was the sight, for the first time ever, of our tiny Grammie without him standing tall at her side with his hand on her elbow. We watched her walk up to his coffin at the viewing, watched her touch him gently, and kiss his waxen cheek. "Happy sailing, Bill," she said. We watched her take her last look at the man she'd married 60 years before, and our hearts broke for her and for us, and for the end of a relationship that set the standard for the mutual love and respect and loyalty that we sought in our own lives.

This grief is different. It feels more like a misplaced sense of loneliness, like there's someone missing. Which there is, but my heart can't quite feel it so sharply yet. I know she's gone, but I can't really imagine it being true. My mother is being so strong, but for the past ten years she has seen my grandmother through everything, and was my grandparents' rock for a decade before that. There's a pain I feel for her, because she isn't a daughter any more. Even though she'd become more mother than daughter of late, "daughter" isn't a role she actively inhabits on this world any more, and as a daughter myself, I feel acute sorrow and anguish when I imagine being in that place. I know she'll talk to her parents in her prayers. But whether they're 46, 66, or 96, you're never ready for when you can't talk to them in person. As this hits my mother harder -- when the funeral is over, when the packing is done, when it's time to figure out what her life looks like without Grammie in it -- that's when it will really hit me. It's starting a bit even now, as she surveys my grandmother's empty apartment and faces putting a lifetime of memories into a bunch of boxes. "She'd left her glasses sitting on the bathroom sink and I almost couldn't bear to touch them," Mom said, her voice thick with loss.

What a life it was. Gramp and Grammie were the core of the party back in their youth, with legendary booze-ups and stories I need told to me again and again because I lose the details in the laughter. They're stories my mom and her siblings tell with blushes and hands clapped to their foreheads, and rivers of mirth streaming down their cheeks. Grammie was a great-grandmother for more than seven years, she met the husbands of the three grandchildren she knew best, and she experienced the unconditional love of a daughter and her husband -- who treated her like his own mother -- who would do anything for her, any time, any place, anywhere. She showed us strength and dignity, and my mother showed us unimagined stores of selfless devotion that made us swell with pride at what an amazing line of women came before us.

The past year has been difficult for her. Spoiled by all those ageless years, it was frustrating for her heart -- "The heart of a 50-year old except for that one valve," her doctor said -- to slow her pace. She hated having to push through the lack of energy, the lethargy, the shortness of breath. Her mind still spun too quickly for that. After a particularly difficult, scary day, my mother and her brother tucked her in and gently told her they loved her, and that whenever she decided it was time to be with Gramp, they would miss her terribly but they would understand. "Great. If only it were that easy," Grammie sighed with a chuckle. She'd lived the heck out of 96 years and she was ready to be with her Bill again, if only her body would cooperate.

But they're together again now. On what would be her last day, she spoke to my uncle and told him she'd felt pretty good, lively enough to go downstairs for dinner; there was a special chocolate cake on offer that night, and she decided to let herself splurge on a piece. Then she went upstairs, took my uncle's call before she went to bed, and said, "You know what? I had a really wonderful day today." And then she fell asleep for the last time. It's exactly what she wanted -- painless, seamless, quiet. And all we can ask is that she went after one last happy time. She didn't go to bed frustrated or agonized. She was, truly, in a moment of peace.

It's times like this when I'm so certain there's an afterlife, because it is the only comforting reality, and in another sense, the only logical one. Because I can't imagine my grandfather not having been here all along, invisibly sitting by her side, ready to greet her whenever it was her time. He'd have charmed all of Heaven while he waited for her to finish up on Earth, watching, loving her from afar, spying as she stuck around to make sure we were all in good hands before she left to join him. I can see his face in my mind, its openness and genuine delight in the experience of talking to others, and in the pride of having married her. He named his boat the Rare Mood, after a line from his favorite song, "It's Almost Like Being In Love," from the musical Brigadoon -- a song he would sing so casually at random moments. "What a day this has been..." is sometimes as far as he got before one of us would give him a big hug, or join in the song. "What a rare mood I'm in; oh, it's almost like being in love." I remember so many times that he sang, squeezed her hand, made her laugh, made us all laugh. I know when she gently passed, the first thing her spirit heard was her beloved Bill's voice singing the song as if on cue.

"She's with him now, Mom," I said.

"I hope so. I have to believe it, that he's there, reaching out to hold her hand," she said softly, her voice catching.

"Oh, I think he's been holding her hand since long before she passed."

"And now she gets to hold his."

We love you, Grammie. We miss you. Give Gramp our love.

Maybe We'll Write A Story About A Rich Teen Named Cleopatra

Just in case you thought this blog is going to be all My Little Pony all the time for a while, that's not my intent at all. I've just gotten so caught up in stuff -- Fug Madness turned time-consuming, my house is messy, we had taxes to sort out and paperwork to file, proposals to write, and a trip to plan. Exciting stuff, but all of it leaves my eyes and fingers too tired sometimes to blog about my boring feelings.

Jessica and I are hard at work on a proposal for a young-adult novel, or series of novels, and it's one of the hardest things I've ever done. We're so happy that we're finally toiling away at this, but it's a whole new comfort zone for me and I keep thinking it shouldn't be so tricky -- that if I'm meant to do it, the words and ideas should flow gracefully and naturally through my hands onto the glaring white Word document. But in fact, it's hard. You have to give people names, personalities. You have to avoid the pitfalls of making your main character the least interesting. And worse, the characters have to do things. We think about all the books that read so natural to us, like Suite Scarlett or the Gossip Girl books, and how logical and simple and easy and elegant the premises are that blow up into good drama between clearly defined characters, and we look at what we do and wonder if it will ever seem that right. Of course, this is forgetting that those authors probably sat at home at one point going, "God, this is hard. Will people think Chuck Bass is just a New York version of Bruce Patman? I'd better give him a monkey just in case." We need to find our monkeys.

In happier news, though, we're going to Egypt! Kevin and Jess and I are just in the mood for a really meaty sightseeing trip, and every year that goes by where I'm not knocked up, I figure I might as well try to see more of the world before it gets harder and costlier. So the three of us are dividing a week between Cairo and Luxor, which will be somewhat of a whirlwind but also totally brilliant, I think. Apart from British History, Egypt was always my favorite unit in any history class, and to think I will walk across the sands of Giza toward the pyramids and the Sphinx blows my mind.

It won't be easy -- we'll get sick, I'm sure; everyone does. And there's the heat, the poverty, the touts  and grifters who try to get money from you. But I get more fired up for it by the day, because it's a part of the world I never thought I'd see, and I don't know why. Egypt felt so far, so remote, so inaccessible. I love the pyramids and the idea of the tombs, but it never occurred to me that, hey, they're just right over there, why not go see them? It'll be like strolling through the pages of a history text, but with more sweat. I want to float down the Nile with a drink in my hand, and soar over Luxor in a balloon. Both are on the agenda. I can't believe it.

So the bruising pace of our work is invigorating to me -- it's like pushing toward something. Heads down, pencils up; we're gunning at our departure date so that when we fly off, we're really, truly away, if only for a short time.