I grabbed my opposite elbows with gloved hands as we walked back to the car parked at the top level of the hospital parking ramp. I opened the door, descended to my seat, and said something terribly witty—and I do mean terrible-y witty. I don't remember just what it was, because I say many terrible-y witty things in a day. Often, I am left with the task at laughing at them alone, and why should today prove differently?

I looked to my stony-faced mother with the flickering remains of my laugh still playing about my smile. She commented, looking over the top rim of her glasses, "You've got crow's feet."

Deflated, but reminding myself that she just got connected to her 24-hour chemo and was probably uncomfortable, I bit back a sharp retort and replied, "I like to think of them as laugh lines...MOTHER."

I was almost as flattered as I was last Friday when we sat in that Chinese restaurant and Brenda exclaimed as though she were the circus ringmaster announcing the freak show, and at a volume and pitch loud enough for France to hear, "Your [ear]lobes are attached to your head!"