my maternal grandmother wrote this note to me during the hardest times of my adult life.  i had checked into a psych ward at Stanford and wasn’t eating.  just a fetal position.  all that was happening was my breathe, in and out.  the funny part is that i was bribed into eating very easily.  looking back, i’d bet Jeff had thought of a possible solution.  my roomie brought in one of those huge bags of peanut m&ms.  i was sneaking some, one at a time.  after a while the roomie came back and gave me the bag, claiming she didn’t want any anymore.  thus was i brought back. actually looking back, friends and food have saved me more than once.  aymi brought me back with a banana.   my mom brought me back when i was 3 with a chocolate frosted donut. i haven’t had any of those massive depressions that lasted very long, yes, a caveat.  after The Talk between H and I when i thought we were over for sure was almost as intense as any other psych pain i’d had.   food did not bring me back that time.  it was much better when i was collected.  i got pissed.  healthier i think.  *rueful laff*. anyway, there’s part of the note my granny wrote me, post M&Ms, i’ll post the rest later, when it chooses to pop back up. My dear Minikin,

Last night I wrote you a long letter of my memories and thoughts.  This is Tuesday morning and I want to remind you of some of the good times we have had.  and excuse my writing as I do not have my new glasses yet which perfects the way I can see in every aspect.  I know there does appear to be lines on this paper, but they seem so dim, it’s hard to keep right on it.  I see beautifully for most any subject now.  Then to my arthritic thumb and forefinger which holds my pen is so misshapen that i do not always make the exact move I plan to make.  Well, anyway, can you remember the Easter Egg Hunt at Aunt June and Uncle Ed Roger’s up at Sacramento on Easter?  That was a fun day, I thought.  and we made so many lovely trips to the mountains and beaches.  Do you remember “Bear Mountain” and the train ride and picnic there?  Aunt Lois was also with us.  And I believe Louis was a baby that year.  I can’t recall for certain, or was Pam very young yet?  Anyway I think you would remember that.  Do you remember when we went to the big Beach Park in Santa Cruz (is that the right name?) and you girls walked in the edge of the water.  And we bought some big bags of popcorn.  And somebody’s popcorn got to leaking out of the bottom and you thought we out to stop and pick it all up? That’s the way I remember it.  I think it was solved by a grown up holding that bag and twisting up the bottom.  And you had such a lovely home in Livermore and the year it was so gorgeous with roses and shrubs and flowers and grass. Lucile Deacon