“Mom, isn’t it a bit too early?”
“Early? The rain has almost fl ooded your ass!”
In our home dialect, she spoke with a note of bitterness that somehow originated from her encounter with death. She composed a strong picture with an element of quirkiness in her strange voice, as though the words came from somewhere in the distance, in the past. Her nose was blocked, but not her fi rmness. It was the fi rst time she had actually showed such a sense of humor.
Every now and then, she had to unblock her nose. The struggling sound of her breathing was the sound of thick air rubbing roughly through the tiny gaps in her nostrils. Even when the clatter and bustle of her movements echoed distinctly, the symptoms of her asthma were left uncovered. With love, how easily she relented and asked, “Aren’t you starving?”