Jessica Jones (Netflix) is my favorite superhero.  Her wardrobe is more biker chick than Super Woman. She drinks alone. She uses belligerence and coldness to keep people at bay, hoping to sidestep entanglement. In fact, she considers herself a former superhero turned private investigator, where hiding in shadows and avoiding people is in the job

I walked into my mother’s room to find a bearded man in a down vest and hiking boots standing at the foot of her death bed.  He introduced himself and I recognized his name immediately. He was the nursing home doctor. AKA my mother’s nemesis. Their relationships spanned several years, because she’d been in and out of

One day in February 2017, I thought “My mother is dying.” She had been fighting health problems for several years; but, that day, I knew in my heart when she turned a corner. It was, of course, true that she was dying. In fact, it was true the day she was born. When she started teaching

I kept the condolence cards after my mother’s death.  Every one of them. I saved the Facebook post announcing her passing, with all the comments from close and distant friends. The notes lit my darkest hour. I still can’t give them up.  I may be buried with them. So many people reached out after she died. The

 Me: Scout, when you die, don’t get drawn into being a cat again. It says here animal lives don’t help you progress much toward enlightenment. Scout: How is enlightenment better than a warm lap and bottomless bowl of food? Me: ? Good question. I was reading the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche, with Scout the doula cat

In 2014, my 88-year-old father-in-law passed out at breakfast, in the middle of his favorite restaurant. As the nearest relative, my husband got the call from the hospital. They said he would survive, but they would not release him to live independently. We had three days to find him a new home in an assisted