The Woman I Was Dying to Know —
The first time I truly saw my mother as a person, her body lay in a casket under the dim lights of the funeral home’s chapel. Her viewing was scheduled from 4 to 8 p.m. That’s a really long time to look at the woman you thought was invincible. Despite the cosmetologist’s best efforts, my mother still looked very dead. The foundation that was spread across her painfully swollen face wasn’t her shade. Or maybe it might have been if she were alive.
My mother was only the second dead body I had see
