He listened and asked whether I had finally bought myself a proper chair for my apartment.

I looked at the wobbling chair I’d rescued from the curb years earlier and laughed.

“Not yet,” I admitted.

“Then you still don’t understand my daughter’s instructions,” he said.

“She didn’t leave you a lifelong assignment to be useful.

She wanted you to have a life.”

I went shopping the next weekend and bought a comfortable chair.

It wasn’t extravagant, but it was sturdy and sat near the window where the afternoon light fell across my books.