This is a picture of a blooming peace lily. It normally sits on the counter, right next to this laptop, but I thought the dining room table would be more aesthetically pleasing for a picture. What is so special about this plant? It is the last of the living plants that we received the week after Thomas died. We got a number of them, but the rest have all gone. This one looks to be immortal. One of the other November 2004 moms also got a lot of plants--several years ago we compared survival rates (neither of us having a good record)--I must ask her whether she has any left too. This is the first time I remember seeing this thing bloom since we got it and I have no idea why it did this time. In honor of the effort though, I dusted off its leaves for the first time in . . . a while. Maybe this is a metaphor for hope, springing up unexpectedly from a not very promising source.

Hmmm. PS: The prints in the background are from a Native American artist named April White. Look her up!

I'm beginning to think that there is another low point in grief sometime after the sixth year. The six-week low seems pretty well documented and understood but people seem to stop talking about grief some time after the first year or so. But I gotta tell you, the last few months have been kind of rough. It's odd to me that I've had those moments of bursting into tears when alone--they had pretty much faded away a couple of years ago, but they seem to be reviving. It is true that I am also dealing with my mother-in-law's illnesses and hospitalizations and it does seem clear that she is nearing the end of her life but things about Thomas come up too. A couple of Deuce Four guys have friended me on Facebook recently. Another has died this week, not someone I'd met. It just seems like there's more than enough sorrow to go around recently.