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Chapter One The concept of a chair or an apple or any concrete object seems to be the only truly lasting thing about it since, clearly, the object comes into being and “exists” for a certain period of time, and then passes out of existence. What about abstract things like Love? Is love therefore no longer “real” as a physical object can be no longer “real” because the dynamic exchange - the period of its existence in reality - has ended? Some part of me raged at this idea. No! Love and kindness, existing only as ideas, are more “real” in some realm of abstraction. But we have no access. When the dynamic in which those abstractions exist in material terms ceases to be active, where does it go? In what realm does this world of ideas of engendered things exist, be they solid or In the simplest of terms, my thoughts were: my grandmother is dead; how can I know she still loves me? What am I to do with the love I The answers offered by the Christian faith in which I grew up suddenly seemed not merely unsatisfactory, but downright insulting to the memory of my grandmother and the bond that had existed between us. The ideas of Spiritualism and the concepts of reincarnation were only slightly helpful. As far as I was concerned, there was no proof. There was a lot of circumstantial or anecdotal evidence and conjecture; but there was also another side: such evidence was declared to be either psychologically unsound or a satanic delusion to lead us astray depending on whether you asked scientists or the church. But the issue remained. For what purpose is love engendered, and where does it go when the dynamic interaction in this reality comes to an end? It’s cheap and easy to say that “love never dies”, and that love continues to exist between us and our loved ones who are no longer with us in some “astral” plane or place of the dead; or that we will meet the dear departed at some end-time resurrection. I was not satisfied with “The Lord gives and the Lord takes away; blessed be the name of the Lord”. Even worse was: “It’s not for us to understand God’s ways; it’s a Mystery!” And I most definitely wasn’t going to have a séance and try to talk to my grandmother. To attempt to resurrect her that way felt blasphemous to the love I had for her, even worse than the idea she was “lost to me” until some final “end time” resurrection. I was pregnant at the time my grandmother died, and the baby was born in the Spring of 1985. As a result of injuries I suffered during the delivery, I was bedridden for many months after only ideological? have to give her? What is the medium of exchange? Is it over? Is there no more? If so, then what’s the point, damn it?