The first time I gave a eulogy was thirty years ago for my favorite uncle. It started with “you can’t pass unless you give me a nickel, dime, and quarter.” At four years old I stood in a doorway with my arms stretched and repeated the saying whenever he came home.

There are a number of symptoms of dementia, one of which is repeating oneself over and over thinking it is the first time it’s being told. In phone conversations with my dear friend of fifty years, she tells me that she’d received a phone call from her niece.

The fig tree has taken off and blocks the sun, but it feeds me dark-skinned juicy fruit. The low hanging ones make breakfast a treat. The higher fruits are out of reach, but I can’t complain about the tree’s generosity for ten days here in Calabria, under the roof of my ancestors.

When we stop laughing at ourselves as we age, our losses feel greater, our aches and pains are stronger, last longer. Humor is the sunshine of our emotions, filling us with vitamins and minerals for the soul.