March Madness

This has been a month of medical procedures for me. I found myself putting this and that off, and then when I heard that Wendy was dying—suddenly all this time opened up in my schedule for all of those time-consuming medical visits. The list is long and gruesome, but I’ll leave it that it involved being stuck with needles, lying in a tube, ultra sound gel, drinking potions, and worst of all: being weighed!
Wendy was a colleague and friend, and among the many cool things about her it stated right there in her obituary that she made her own knishes. They were good too. Evan and I got to try them when we ventured to Staten Island once for a party at her house. It was the kind of party where the people “in the know” hung out in the kitchen for first dibs.
A friend who visited her while she was in the hospice told the story of how Wendy declared that she had become much more blunt since she got sick. More blunt? How could that be possible? This was not a woman who pulled punches. I had a hard time with how blunt she could be with me. “You know you’re cat’s going to die from this, right?” she said when Sula was first diagnosed with kidney disease. When I confessed having trouble being pregnant at the same time my mom was dying she instructed that I would have to look at why I chose to get pregnant at that point. That was a little more bluntness than I was hoping for right then.
Still, she was funny and committed to doing good work: one of those atheists who serve the common good better than many believers.
What does this have to do with dinner? Well, family. Near her 50th birthday Wendy reported that she came up with the meaning of life. I feel lucky that I was one of the ones she shared it with: spend time with the people you love. She did that, and threw herself a big birthday party. It wasn't as fancy as Oprah's, but then Wendy wasn't the kind of person who liked a lot of attention.
So now as I’m waiting for my date with Dr. G.I. and his sleep inducing cocktail (sounds like a bad date), I’m starving. Hungry for that cinnamon toast I smell The Husband making downstairs. Hungry for the sandwich from Via Quadronno that I’ve requested for after the date, I mean "procedure." Hungry for dinner.


P.P.S. Everything's fine; thanks for asking.