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NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 2010
I received a letter from his daughter the other day.
Angela.
I’d thought about Angela many times over the years, but this was only our third interaction.
The first was when I’d made her wedding dress, back in 1971.
The second was when she’d written to tell me that her father had died. That was in 1977.
Now she was writing to let me know that her mother had just passed away. I’m not sure how Angela expected me to receive this news. She might have guessed it would throw me for a loop. That said, I don’t suspect malice on her part. Angela is not constructed that way. She’s a good person. More important, an interesting one.
I was awfully surprised, though, to hear that Angela’s mother had lasted this long. I’d assumed the woman had died ages ago. God knows everyone else has. (But why should anyone’s longevity surprise me, when I myself have clung to existence like a barnacle to a boat bottom? I can’t be the only ancient woman still tottering around New York City, absolutely refusing to abandon either her life or her real estate.)
It was the last line of Angela’s letter, though, that impacted me the most.
“Vivian,” Angela wrote, “given that my mother has passed away, I wonder if you might now feel comfortable telling me what you were to my father?”
Well, then.
What was I to her father?
Only he could have answered that question. And since he never chose to discuss me with his daughter, it’s not my place to tell Angela what I was to him.
I can, however, tell her what he was to me.