Elliot. Then Elliot. Then, carefully, Uncle Elliot. Every inch of it meant more to me than any job I ever did in Canada.

My mother had to learn the same lesson the hard way — that she could not buy her way to grandmother status with an armful of gifts and an unannounced visit.

“Samantha is their mother,” I told her, standing in front of my ex-wife and taking the weight of my mother’s anger myself, the way I should have learned to a decade ago.

“If you want to be in their lives, you respect her boundaries.” Three weeks later my mother came back alone, with a quiet box of pastries and no entourage, and lowered her eyes, and said she was sorry.

“You owe me a great deal more than an apology, Regina,” Samantha said.

“But for their sake, we can start here.” No cinematic embrace.