"I took off my glasses. She took off her glasses. I took a step toward her. She took a step toward me...."

People say that if you look back, you'll miss what's in front of you, or something like that. But there are apps to show you what you were doing this time last year, 4 years ago, 6 years, etc.... I'm nearing the end of my first year without my mother and looking back to this time last year comes to me unbidden and painful.

John Irving and Elizabeth Kübler-Ross and moist-faced family members with arms outstretched all seem to have had the opinion that the first year is the hardest. We shall see then, shall we? 

This time last year I was heading to my mother, knowing that her light was dimming but unsure how long we'd have her. 

This time in 2012, I was increasingly aware that my pregnancy was not taking and that I would soon miscarry. 

This time in 2004, before facebook or instagram (indeed, in those days when friendster was slowly becoming passé) I was regularly flirting with the man who would become my husband, wondering if he was truly worth pursuing, as I would soon be heading to Philadelphia. 

I quit smoking at 26. I'd begun smoking at 13 and didn't want to be a smoker longer than I'd been a non-smoker. I looked back to plan the future.

I lost my lower intestine at age 16. I am now 33 and have lived longer without a lower-intestine than I lived with it. This experience of losing an organ, which felt so dramatic, signified this short period in my life of an excessively long digestive tract.

I look forward to having known Ivo longer than I didn't (only 9 years to go) and changing beside him as he changes and seeing how those new people, who are foreign to our current selves, will relate to one another and these us-es.

but tomorrow is another day