We did not take an hour like that one for granted, because we knew, all of us, in our bones, what it was to not have it, to sit in a house heavy with a mother’s absence, to get through birthdays and holidays that ached with an empty chair.

So when a genuinely good hour came, a wedding, a ceremony, a young man weeping with joy at the sight of his bride, we knew to gather it up and hold it and be fully present inside it, because we had learned the hard way that such hours are gifts and not guarantees.

Laura, in her glittering gown, was incapable of being present at that hour, too busy performing it.

We, who had been given so much less, knew exactly how to receive it.