Last week I cooked artichokes

for the first time in my life and not planning it, the cooking and eating of them became another memorial for my Grandma Min, who died two years ago this month. I use artichoke hearts from a can a lot when I cook and I cook a lot but I had never cooked a whole artichoke for Fred and me, so we could eat it, leaves and all. I had bought the artichokes thinking that I would cook them for Fred and me to eat on Valentine's Day but then I ended up going to visit my baby niece Mira (named for Minerva) on Valentine's Day and so the artichokes sat in the fridge. It was last Monday night, just an ordinary night, when I took the artichokes out and steamed them whole for seven minutes. They came out tender

and we had fun, eating slowly, picking off the leaves. June wanted to try one and she liked it. I showed her how to dip the leaf (though I used olive oil instead of butter) just the way that my grandmother had taught me to do, when she made artichokes for us during a visit to our house when I was seven-years-old. That was who my Grandma was in my life--

the person who introduced me to interesting things, to culture, who had a kind of magicalness to her, maybe the same magic that exists between all grandparents and grandchildren, but for me, Minerva was always my north star. Sitting at my table, dipping artichoke leaves with June, I could feel her. I could remember that night, sitting in our kitchen in Duncansville, me watching Grandma to see how she ate the artichoke. I tried to imitate the graceful way she dipped her leaf but did not drip her butter. She had no idea, really, what an influence she was

on me. I married Fred because of her...he was the only boyfriend of mine that she ever liked. But that is a story that I will unpack another day. For now I want to say how grateful I was to have been shopping at Trader Joe's in a frenzy after getting out after the last blizzard and to have paused in front of the globe artichokes and decided on impulse to buy them. And how also I am grateful that even as I still grieve Minerva, I understand how her being gone from this world is showing me how love does live and endure. My friend Yitz says "Only love." It is a revolutionary way to live and I can't say

that I live it, not 100%, but am I moving towards that, yes, I think I am. I like that I can sit in my kitchen on an ordinary night, dipping artichoke leaves into olive oil and the extraordinary power of my grandmother's love can wash over me and hold me and I can share it right there, with my daughter so that truly I experience how our consciousness is connected and I have never nor any of us been alone.

We ate all of the leaves down to the thistle part and picked them off and discarded them and then we savored the heart.
***
Also this week, George lost his first tooth. It had been loose for a few weeks but he hadn't let me wiggle it at all. I kept giving him apples, but he bit around them (smart boy). Then the other day, when I had finished work and picked up the kids from school and we were all lounging on my bed watching a video in a semi-exhausted state, George pulled on his tooth a little bit, gave a short cry, and there I saw it, his baby tooth against his red sweatshirt.

I said the Shehechiyanu prayer, thanking God for sustaining us and bringing us to this moment. It hit me like a brick, seeing that tiny baby tooth against his big chest, seeing his toothless smile. I remember so well the painful hours of George's teeth coming in; it was never easy, his teething. I remember the endless walks up and down the hills of Roxborough where we lived, George snuggled againist me in his Baby Bjorn. I remember exhausted finally getting him to sleep at night only to have him wake an hour later, screaming. I remember Fred's midnight runs to Rite-Aid for infant motrin and I remember all of the homepotahic remedies for teething that I diligently tried, then trashed. Whatever we did, it wasn't easy for him; but there, a few days ago relaxing with June and me in my bedroom, his tooth fell out with ease.

It was another moment where it felt like a conversation between God and me, something about the mystery of it all, how some times in our life are so achingly hard and how some are so effortless, so full of ease. So much in the past few months has been feeling that way for me, is it my "Only Love" intention bringing the ease forth?

It gave me hope, too, in a way that since there are so many things that are still so, so hard for George--his speech in particular--that maybe there can be other moments like his first tooth falling out for him, where grace will just appear and things can be easier. That is my prayer, God, since we are in this conversation I'll continue it here, that is my prayer for George, that not only is he surrounded with only love but that things could open up and become easier for him.

This I know, taking out his little tooth from time to time this week from the satin pocket in my jewelery box where it's going to live, taking out his tooth and holding it in my hand, I am happy to be here with him now, to appreciate the way he is becoming such a big kid, to begin saying goodbye to those baby teeth and their memories and to open to what is ahead for us.

And if things don't become easier for my baby, my big boy, I also know that only love surrounds us and fuck it, I have a PhD in dealing with hard stuff, so I will meet what is.