on grief and writing as affordable self indulgence
This is a picture of my father from some time in the last few years on the deck of their last house in NH. It's kind of a big grill so I think it was a few years ago -- the grill got smaller as he got less enthused about cooking -- or maybe that there were less of us for him to cook for, since it was mostly just him and my mother. And a year ago, the small grill went to Rhode Island to my sister's and they moved to an apartment in a place where the nice people in the dining hall did the grilling for you. I say that I don't have a lot to say about the things that have happened this summer, that writing about your own life is so self indulgent -- but the reality is that I do and it does not appear that I have access to the usual Upper Middle Class White Person's Solution to Stress (aka "vacations, spa treatments, culinary classes, therapy, shopping, private trainers or marathon running"). So, here is a first shot at it -- this is the eulogy I wrot