On snowy winter days, next to sandals, we listened to sweet stories from my mother, joked with our neighbor's children, fought, reconciled soon after. Our childhood happiness was those street games. Life was going on with such pleasant days. One day we were busy making snowballs in the middle of our yard, hearing the news of the arrival of a new guest at our house. I did not know, maybe because I love children, I expected him to grow up very quickly. It was the second day from the birth of the prince, we would argue with our family to choose his name. When I said Muhammad, my brother said Ahmad, my mother wanted to give him a name, which is Mustafa, and my dad wanted to join what his other sons said. Finally, all of us were left blank, and the name my mother told us were chosen, that is, we agreed to name my little brother Mustafa. Mustafa was the candle light of our house, we were a propeller, we were spinning on its top. We had to make a vaccine for his health, so after a week his treatment ended. Just like any other night, this evening we were sitting together near the cradle of Mustafa, laughing and speaking together with him. I do not know for some reason my brother's health deteriorated, that is, he himself fainted. We were all surprised, our eyes were blind, we could not see the right way, my mother's voice, my child, was barely heard! My brother lay with light from his eyes with his red winter clothes, where now if such glowing eyes open! Where their lovely voices come out with a cry song! My mother shouted, my daughter in a hurry, break some dishes. I do not know if this was an old tradition left over from our ancestors, our people thought that it was useful to break dishes on such days. My mother did it herself, unable to bear the fact that I was looking. But where would this work give results?! Where does my brother open his eyes?! On the snowy days of that winter, a car was also not found in our village, so long as we took my brother to the hospital. Our father brought the imam of our neighbourhood, read the verses of the Quran. My brother remained so long after this happened. We were laughing at home with my brother, and suddenly his health is again deteriorated, unable to breathe terribly scared me. My mother was baking bread in the oven that day. I didn't know what happened to the bread on that day, who baked it?! Mommy wept and took my brother to the hospital. I waited for my brother by the door, I cried, why my brother remained that way. I thought when I would take my brother in my arms. We waited a lot, but there was no news, finally in the evening my brother's phone heard a ringing sound, if he answered, it turned out that dad. We are all glad to hear my father's voice, when did we ask you to come? They said they couldn't come tonight and told my brothers that they looked good at us. We were happy to know their situation, but this evening our house looked very quiet and dark. We were all waiting for my brother again in the morning. Unfortunately, these expectations took too long! Too much, that is, by sixteen days, the prince of our house came. But it was the last day I would wait for them to come crying. Seeing Mustafa was a new life of tolerance for us. My dad with my mother was very tired, but even then my two eyes did not lose my brother. I asked my brother why he stayed in the hospital for so long after they had some rest. They replied that nothing had happened, only a little cold. Even though we are children, we do not agree with this and ask my mother again: there will be nothing for my brother, right? My mother laughed like this by stroking us in the head: - Of course… But the evening was very good in my brother's state. We all laughed together and prayed to my God. I cooked “samsa” that night. When the “samsa” was ready, we also gave it to our neighbour, and then we all ate together, Mustafa was smiling in the cradle. Now we would ask God that he would not be ill again. This night sky stars flashed more. We haven't been in peace for a long time, it was a holiday for us late. Until midnight, we were all lying in peace. At that moment, my mother came and said that my brother's condition was not good. Indeed, my brother was not in good condition, breathing very hard. This time, his condition was different. He would take the last breaths of his life. It was very difficult to state this situation. My father's moaning, my mother's word mixed cry is still in my eyes. Dad would cry and repeat this word: - May your father sacrifice to you, Mustafa, open your eyes! Please lovely son! Our house was covered by the sound of mourning. This event made our yard very dark, no one wanted to stay in this house, we had no hope of living, my brother smelled pleasant from all corners of our house. Unfortunately, the treatment of this patient was impossible in Afghanistan.

Resilience was not a word I thought about a lot until a few days ago. Waves upon waves of bad news have been storming our homes for months now and my conservative South- Asian upbringing didn't include swimming lessons of any kind. But the more I think about this word, and let it roll over my tongue, the more I realize that I'm quite familiar with it. In fact, it's been growing wild in my warm apartment kitchen. About a year ago, on a sunny Monday morning, I married a wonderful man. Typical arranged marriage situation, except of course, for the very atypical global pandemic we are in. We first met at a generic coffee shop, taking off our face masks hesitantly for an awkward hello. We met many times after, always swapping stories over a meal and spent about three months getting to know each other before the date of our actual ceremony. Given the pandemic conditions, the usual jokes every bride hears about learning to cook before her wedding were passed over for repetitive concerns on sanitization and social distancing. I'm certain we discussed food preferences, but the early romantic fog must have kept me from clearly seeing just how important food and its preparation would prove to be once I moved out of my parents' home and into my own! I'm telling you this because I found myself thoroughly perplexed a few weeks later. Cooking, as it turns out, was more at the heart of a marriage than I had considered. I've seen TV dramas where the kitchen shelves are neatly stacked and all the appliances are in the right locations, but even the scenes that depict people actually cooking don't fully capture the emotion of what goes on in a home kitchen on a daily basis. I didn't know that I didn't know how to cook. I certainly didn't know how to cook a full meal for two people in the forty minutes between when I sleepily entered the kitchen each morning and when I ran out the front door screaming about being late for work again. The opportunities to make mistakes were so many – dicing the right number of vegetables, pouring an exact amount of oil, mixing in the perfect amount of spice and so on. At first, I found this daily task sitting restlessly on top of the heaviness I rolled around all day- the fear of a virus. I was determined to make excuses for my inadequacies. This pandemic, I can say with relief, is not something I'm responsible for. But my cooking is. And the more I began to view it as a therapeutic pushback against the devouring thing that lived across the floor from me, as a tiny act that expressed my love for my partner, the more it became an activity I could rely on rather than resist. So maybe I know a few things about resilience. It has been thriving since I've learned to ask “What would you like to eat today?”

Made a pasta dish for the first time, or at least I tried. The penne pasta came out great, though. Choosing to celebrate the small wins! Was I deluded into thinking I was too good for the fool proof spaghetti, or was it the novelty of cooking something I couldn't pronounce? I would never tell.

When you're born and raised in the beautiful PNW, you know how the seasons are year - round. You've observed how the dreary, wet winters can go all the way into what should be the blossoming of June.\nAs a child into my teen years, the shorter days would take a toll on my self worth. When that was the case, my wonderful mother would take us to Nordstrom's Cafe in Clackamas every Friday for that tomato - basil - pick - me - up - cure.\n\nNothing compares to the delicate, bold flavors of roasted Roma tomatoes and fresh basil pairing with the most flavorful toasted baguette bites. This, in my head, will always be true bliss \u2014 especially on the never ending days. Every bite that entered my body was the warm comfort I've been needing since the warm fall days faded into long, soaked winter nights. Filling me up with warm courage to face the weekend, I'd take what I couldn't finish to go because I knew I'd need it again.\n\nThis creamy tomato basil soup will warm up every inch of your soul and bring it to life even on the coldest, dullest days! When I found out this easy, healthy version not only helps my husband and I stay motivated during the darker times, it's so much better than Campbell's! It's a child - proof recipe I love pulling out everytime it starts to feel like the Fall - idays!\n\nIngredients - Creamy Tomato Soup:\n\u20221 large yellow onion\n\u20223 large cloves garlic\n\u20221/4 Avocado (or Extra Virgin Olive) oil - normal or garlic infused\n\u20222 1/2 pounds Roma or tomatoes on the vine\n\u20221 large carrot - cut into chunks\n\u20222 teaspoons salt\n\u2022A few shakes of red pepper flakes\n\u2022Freshly ground black pepper\n\u20221/2 cup heavy cream (or chicken stock)\n\u202210 large fresh basil leaves, plus more for serving\n\u20221 block of Boursin cheese (or use heavy cream at the very end).\n\nIngredients - Parmesan and Garlic Crostinis:\n\u20221 French Baguette\n\u20224 tbsp butter\n\u20221/2 cup Parmesan cheese, hand grated or pre shredded\n\u20221 clove of garlic\n\u20221/4 teaspoon Italian seasoning\n\nBlending options:\nAn immersion blender is the easiest & safest way to pur\351e this soup, but I prefer a standard blender like my NutriBullet I use. It honestly works just as well \u2014 If opting to use a blender, please work in batches and make sure the feed hole or tube is open while blending so that steam (heat) can escape. Pur\351eing even a warm liquid could result in a messy (not to mention dangerous!) explosion, so work in 10-12 second intervals at a time!\n\nInstructions - Tomato Soup For The Soul with Blender:\n1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.\n2. (If using Boursin): place cheese block in middle of your sprayed casserole dish.\n3. Chop all your vegetables (tomatos, carrots, onion) into 1/4's and place them in the same dish with your Boursin!\n4. Place your garlic cloves in the dish - unpeeled.\n5. Drizzle on 1/4 cup Avocado / Olive Oil across your veggies & cheese block (make sure it covered every vegetable in that dish)!\n6. Season vegetables with your salt, pepper and red pepper flakes.\n7. When the oven's ready, place your dish on the bottom rack for 45 minutes or until vegetables have softened and tomatoes are splitting and sizzling.\n8. Take your pan of roasted vegetables out of the oven and place on top of the stove - add a pinch of salt to the simmering bliss - let stand for 10-15 minutes or until it's cooled down enough.\n9. When your all - in - one - pan has cooled down, put your vegetables (minus the garlic) and Boursin in a blender \u2014 we use our full size NutriBullet.\n10. Get your 3 garlic cloves and squeeze the tapered ends; the roasted garlic will slice out of it's peel with ease! Pop them into the blender.\n11. Grab those fresh Basil leaves (or 2 teaspoons of dried basil) and dash it into the blender with your tomato base.\n12. BLEND BABY!! I usually manually press and pulse the mixture to get it chopped up so it doesn't overheat!\n13. **If you want your soup to be thinner: Get 1/2 cup heavy cream or chicken stock (cooled) and add it to the mix: BLEND SOME MORE!\n14. Once you get it to the desired consistency of your choice (chunky or smooth), pour some soup into 2- 4 bowls & garnish with fresh basil, black pepper, and Parmesan cheese! Serve with a side of Parmesan Crostinis or crumble some on top for that satisfying crunch!\n\nInstructions - Parmesan & Garlic Crostinis:\n1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.\n2. Combine your 4 tbsp butter, Parmesan, and Italian seasoning into a bowl so you have this aromatic herb butter!\n3. Slice up your French baguette into 1/4\u201d slices.\n4. Butter each slice of bread with your DIY herb butter and place them on a baking sheet.\n5. Top each crostini with fresh Parmesan.\n6. Bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes (until the baguette crust is a crunchy golden brown).\n7. Serve hot as a side with your Tomato Soup For The Soul or crumble them on top for a delicate crunch!

about my bio graphy

If you ask any South Asian kid what their least favorite food is, you will always get one of two answers - karela (bittergourd) or khichdi (a rice dish made with lentils, resembling Italian risotto). Traditional Khichdi does not have the richness or sophistication of a risotto, reserved solely for sick days when a child has the flu or a bad cold. It's usually a soggy mush of lentils and rice, tinged yellow with turmeric and seasoned with salt and pepper. Seems like a far leap from the rich curries and vegetable dishes associated with Indian culture, right? But, at my house, Khichdi was never a boring affair. My mother was raised in a tiny village tucked away in the shadows of the bustling metropolitan city of Kolkata, called Shantiniketan. Bengali cuisine, if you're unaware, is known for the sharp taste of mustard oil, setting your palate up for the tantalizing flavors of fresh fish and vegetables simmering in the most luxurious broth. Any dish is incomplete without small mountains of fluffy white rice, adorned with a small teaspoon of clarified butter or ghee and a dollop of fiery red pickle. I would watch as my mother would stand on her tiptoes, her silver anklets jingling softly as she tried to reach the far back of the wooden cabinets. She was too short, and would call for my dad with a “soon cho?” (are you listening?) instead of his name. I have never heard my mother refer to my father by name, and true to her call, he always listened. He would put down his newspaper and walk into the kitchen, silently retrieving the tarnished container of lentils, with the special type of daal reserved for sick days. She would reach into the container with her bare hands and grab fistfuls of the tiny yellow grains, adding them to a pressure cooker with short-grained basmati rice. He would share a look with her, probably reveling in some kind of inside joke, as she asked him to put the container away. She would giggle, swat at him and tell him to get out of the kitchen. Maa would wash the mixture three times, until the cloudy water would run clear, and fill it with fresh water to the top. She would then reach for her trusty jar of turmeric and add in heaping tablespoon to the concoction, along with some salt, and I would run away as far as possible. I hated the sound of the pressure cooker, the huffing and puffing seeming like the world's worst steam engine, building up to the dreadful moment where the steam would escape with a loud whistling noise. I would count in my head every time the whistle made me want to jump out of my skin, one… and when I least expected it, two. It always made my mum laugh, and she would gently smack my head saying, “beta (child), it's just the whistle.” I would follow her to the kitchen, and watch as she chopped up some red onions and tomatoes into small cubes. It never made her cry, unlike my Dad who would start sniffling while peeling the skin. She heated up a small pot with mustard oil, waiting for the right moment to add the mustard and cumin seeds, freshly plucked curry leaves from our small garden and freshly ground spices. It was my favorite part, I loved watching the spices bloom in the oil - bright red chillies, black pepper and earthy coriander blending into the most wonderful symphonies of flavor. She would add the onions and tomatoes last, barely cooking them so the onions were still translucent and had a slight bite to them, and the tomatoes retained their fresh tart flavor. She would then open the pressure cooker, greeted with a cloud of hot steam as she poured the mixture into the rice-lentil concoction. The colors would change; the khichdi would go from a dull and boring yellow to a vibrant vermilion shade, studded with onions and tomatoes and curry leaves. It had to be served steaming hot, on the nice ceramic plates reserved for guests, adorned with a heaping tablespoon of ghee. It did not matter what ailment you were suffering from, neither did it matter if your head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, or your body was burning with a fever. I've been sick a lot of times in the past few decades, with friends and lovers offering comfort in the form of their home remedies. I have been fed comfort foods from all over the world, be it Arroz Caldo from the Philippines, Italian Pastina, or bright red Borscht. A past boyfriend would make me chicken soup from the can, boiled in a saucepan with a dash of pepper and a generous pour of sriracha. My best friend makes the best rasam, a fragrant soup originating from the South of India, flavored with fresh tamarind and tomatoes. Yet, every single time I wake up with a bad cold or when life seems to get the best of me, I reach for the container of red daal at the back of my kitchen cabinets. I make it just the way maa would, relishing in the warmth of a hug that has traveled through generations of Bengali women to reach my little kitchen.

My relationship with food is highly complicated. Good food is woven into the very fabric of my personality. Nothing cheers me up more than a good meal. Food teaches you patience. Either waiting for the food itself to be finished, or being patient with yourself to master a meal. Food teaches you caution. You can hurt yourself a multitude of ways making one dish. Food teaches you passion. Safe ingredient choices aren't the most delicious ones. Most importantly, we need food. We can't survive without it. So why would food be at all bad? The very reason food is good, echos my problem with food. I like too much of a good thing. I lack self-discipline. Food takes over. I eat and eat until the frustration goes away. Until I am emotionally content and physically drained. I let my emotions guide me and not the physiological signals God has so carefully placed in my body. I am the target, and food is the enemy. But no longer. I will no longer stand in perfect silence; allow people to shriek, “you're not fat!”, as I ponder at the appearance in the mirror that is so far from my personal standard. Food may be the enemy, but I am the conqueror. Call me David, and picture Goliath as a huge potato. I will win. And food will bow before me.

The salmon fillet is the length of my wingspan. Have you ever tried to find good fish in rural Minnesota? That's a trick question. There is fantastic fish. Right outside. In the lake. Super fresh. Catch it. A little lemon. Panko bread crumbs. Delicious. But that gets old after several months. So instead I have this giant fillet that I had to drive thirty minutes both ways to get. Bobby's Flay's cookbook is lying open on the counter next to me. There's a vinaigrette distilling or something with peppers and capers. Already there's been an olive oil spill. A wet spot on the counter where the dog jumped up to steal a piece of broccolini (which is also difficult to find in rural Minnesota). I'm drinking coffee while I do this. At four thirty in the afternoon. Time doesn't matter. I hope this is good. I haven't eaten yet today. I'm buzzing with too much caffeine and not enough food. Before quarantine I could barely cook. I ate everything on the go. Bagels and coffee in the morning. Whatever was close to the theatre at lunch. Takeout late at night for dinner. I could do eggs and rice and ground beef and Seamless. But now there is so much time! It's family recipe week or vegan week or church basement hotdish week. My dad taught me how to pan fry hamburgers. My mom sends me blurry pictures of old recipes she comes across. I make adjustments to the recipes on mommy blogs. I add meat or butter or whatever. I follow TikTok accounts of people who just recreate foods from anime. I learn drop dumplings and pie crusts. I start cutting my tomatoes with a bread knife. If and when I go back to work I won't have time for the things I'm cooking now. But it's nice to do if you have the time. Which I do. I'm out at the lake with my dad, who's retired. I cook him stroganoff or potato soup and we eat it and watch tv. We watch the world keep turning even though we've stopped. My accent gets thicker. I talk more slowly. I've relearned how to be midwestern. Storms pass and I assess the damage to the trees. I remember how to bait a hook. I drive a car again. I dip my feet in the water. I sit on the dock for hours with books I've been meaning to read. And I cook. An email sits in my phone which sits in my pocket. Usually I read emails so fast. It's necessary for my job. But I don't have time to read it as I pick fresh vegetables. Can't look at it at the butcher's. Don't email and drive. Can't read it when I'm wrestling with this giant fillet or prepping the vegetables or trying to remember all the spices in that great orzo recipe. So there's an email on my phone in my pocket informing me that the show I was hired on was postponed again. That March had turned to February had turned to May of 2021. That's a scary thought. But the oven is ready, and I have a fish to cook. Just a truly massive fish.

Because I really don't. Jeremy's been asking me to make them again and I figure you're closer back in time, so you might know. If you don't, that's cool. It's not like we make a practice of taking notes when we cook. Maybe you're further back in time, pre-enchiladas. If you are, I definitely used chicken and tortillas, but after that you're on your own. Don't stress over the whats and the hows; we don't really think it's our best dish. And if you're wondering who Jeremy is: you'll get there. This gastronomic food road you're going down is quite the roller coaster, but the most difficult thing you're going to have to learn is how to cook and eat alone. In grad school, loneliness will become your world and—pun not originally intended—it's going to eat you up. (It won't spit you out, though. It has better table manners than that.) Your studio apartment, while a cozy hug, will suffocate you. Friends you love are moving on with their lives back home. You lose track of the family news. Getting to know people in this new city will feel arduous, and the friends you do make will not plug the black hole sucking you down the drain. You are going to feel so small. All that self-loathing and self-judgement you do now? That's not going to go away. In some ways, it'll get worse. For all you do to try to reach out, you'll fall flat. That year you will mostly sleep in a corner of your bed, surrounded by books and notes. Changing the sheets will require sorting through the stacks and figuring out which tomes are due back at the library. You only close the black-out blinds on mornings when you're hungover. When you come down with the worst flu bug in eternity over spring break, you will watch the 1996 Doctor Who movie for the first and only time, sending outraged texts about the offensive Asian stereotypes and the complete disregard for the entire Doctor Who canon. (And you will disrespect Paul McGann, only to feel horribly conflicted years later when he does a surprisingly strong mini-episode.) You will spend the year living off homemade stove-top stuffing and fried pizza dough. Experiments making peri-peri meringues and sriracha fudge will not go well. There is one sweet side to this sour gummy worm year, though. This is the year of you and your Phebe cat. You've already been together for seven years, but you've never been alone together. There have always been other people, other cats. The spaces you've lived in have never truly been yours. Phebe will be terrified of the windows. Maybe it's because your apartment building is taller than any of the other homes she's lived in; maybe it's because of the traffic. She will only get close if you bribe her with cat grass. You will start every morning together with coffee for you and milk for her. You will develop a fear of using your large chef knife when she's walking around your ankles. (What if you drop it?? Spoiler: you don't.) Multiple times throughout the winter, the fire alarm will go off in the middle of the night. You will have to lift the mattress to get her out from under the bed, then wait outside in the biting cold for the fire department to come and turn off the skull-jarring noise. Phebe will cling to you, and you will be silently aghast your next door neighbors never even try to get their cats out. As you get comfortable, you'll take lazy walks together down the apartment corridors in the middle of the night. Phebe will want to smell every inch of the carpet and will freeze at every sound; you'll want to bring your glass of wine or tea along with you. During the day, she'll sit on your lap, moving the trackpad while you try to type. At night, she'll curl up next to your belly, purring so loudly that you can't imagine another reality. She'll get so comfortable in her space, having you home with her almost all the time, that she'll get sick of you and actually come out of hiding when guests come over. She will develop a fascination with the bathtub and will want to play in it all the time with her ribbons. Obviously, it wasn't my original intention to go from enchiladas to writing a love letter to our cat. Don't worry, even though we're at least seven years out from your timeline, she's still here. More ornery, yes, and not thrilled with the fact that there is, once again, other cat around. Even less thrilled that I dared to welcome a dog into our home. (Being a dog parent is weird. I'll tell your more about that some other time.) But she still curls up in your lap and she still likes her quick lick of bovine lactations. She also enjoys getting some shredded chicken for dinner when I make enchiladas. Enchiladas. I shredded the chicken. Okay, that's one more thing I did. It's still not enough to recreate the recipe. And you know as well as I do that living up to a past success is stressful and difficult. Nerve-wracking. What if you can't get it right? Younger me, I'm sorry to inform you, but after you turn 33, you may never make enchiladas again.

916.5 miles 13 hours 798 minutes 47,880 seconds. Thinking about it is as if my mind has transformed into An effulgent allusion. A scene of the serene tides climbing back and falling off the shores that nestle into the vast, bottomless abyss of blue. My eyes grow lachrymose, and become victim to the overwhelming moisture That falls down my cheeks, that makes my lips tremble. My hands shake, turning ivory as I grip only air. My heart stops, as I breathe only to keep myself alive… But am I? If this is life, then why should I want anything to do with it? I blame myself, fore I went too far, you needed me there, and all I had to do was get in a car. All I had to do was put everything down, come straight to you, leave town. But I didn't, because revenge doomed me, when I thought about you only thoughts of pain consumed me. When I thought of you, my mind went black, I let you down, just as you did to me, and I thought I would be okay with that. But as of now, I can only feel regret, because at 5:13 am when your heat beat grew slow, when your mind shut down, and when your soul flew away All I had to do was travel 916.5 miles 13 hours 798 minutes 47,880 seconds. But I didn't, and you were all alone. And your last few thoughts, to me, are unknown. But when the clock striked 5:13 am. And I wasn't there… I can only imagine how much you thought That I didn't care...

I was 7 years old when I remember my mom first leaving me. I suppose you could've considered me naive. I always thought she intended on coming back. One night, we were hanging out in the living room, watching her favorite; Keeping up with the Kardashians. (Not my taste). The oven was heating up some bagel bites and it rang, indicating they were done. My mom told me to stay put and she'd be back down. So I waited. After a couple minutes I went upstairs and she was sitting at the table, phone in hand, looking distraught. When she saw me she immediately hung up. She asked me if i wanted a coke, I said yes, and she told me she'd be right back. She left into the garage to fetch it. I waited and waited for what felt like forever but finally my patience wore thin. I walked into the kitchen and opened the door to the garage where we kept a fridge full of soda and found the main garage door open into the dark night and my mom no where to be seen. That is my first recollection of my mom leaving me. Throughout my life she would come in and out, always in spurts and never for long. Drugs controlled her life. It got to the point where when she'd stay the night I'd hold her hand so that I would wake up if she went to leave while I slept. Fast forward to when I was about 12. I found out my mom was dying of a liver disease; a rare one. It had been a couple years since I heard from her. She got into contact with my dad, and from then we scheduled calls. I kept up with her as much as my 7th grade mind could. I didn't really comprehend exactly what was happening. 8th grade. By this time my mom was in hospice. Her disease was beyond repair. With her not staying sober, she couldn't be placed on the donor wait list for a liver. On the night of April 31st 2014 my mom died. I was... devastated. I had gotten home from church and my dad called me into the room. He told me and my brother she wasn't going to make it through the night. I remember picking up the phone, and she could barely speak. I said; "Mom... I love you. I miss you. And I forgive you." And just above a whisper. So soft you could barely hear, "I love you." She said. We hung up the phone and my heart died. My life, as I knew it, would never be the same. I would never see my mom at Christmas again. She wouldn't see me dress up for prom. She wouldn't see me graduate. She wouldn't see me walk down the aisle. Now I am 17 years old. It's been almost 4 years and I still hear her last words to me as clear as when she spoke them. I love her. I forgive her. And we both are free.