This is a photo of my mom with me and my sisters on either side. We are a daughter fortress because she and my father's new wife don't speak. Or make eye contact. Or find themselves very often in the same room. That's why in this picture we're all outside. Pam's getting dressed inside and we're trying to keep their paths from intersecting.

Nonna was my father's mother, and my parents have been divorced for ten years.

My younger sisters asked her to fly up to New Jersey to be with all of us as we said our final goodbyes, and I think they meant this in the best way and for her sake, but my mother had said goodbye to Nonna a month earlier, when she came up to take care of her after her colostomy. That was such a gentle and forgiving visit for both of them. I felt bad for my mom, because this one was uncomfortable and frought and after the fact.