Not Today

Sam’s touched up face, slicked brown hair and embalmed body, reminded me that he really was gone.

I sat in the front row as family and friends approached, the same words spoken repeatedly.

“We’re so sorry for your loss, Janny.”

The room filled with flowers, from bleeding hearts to white lilies gave an aroma of a florist rather than a wake.

The priest began to speak, and the room quieted, except for my weeping.

Cancer took my husband too early. He’ll never see his daughter graduate college.

Now I must break the news of my Parkinson’s disease. But not today.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

My First Lie

My stepfather had Parkinson’s disease. Before he died, he was one percent of the person he had been. It’s cruel to say that at fifty percent he was a kinder person.

I found him once, on his back, like an upturned ladybird in the garden. I was now a stranger. I helped him up and in a moment of rare clarity, he asked, "When will this end?" He was all ears, his face ready enlightenment.

I lied to him once. It was my first ever real lie. “Soon,” I said.

Four years on, at his funeral my lie became true.

From Guest Contributor Alice Kibbe