Which is good, because you’re going to have to be up
and running by the time your next grandchild gets here
around the Fourth of July.”
“Oh!” Judith’s smile was huge and satisfying.
“That’s terrific! How is Kristin feeling?”
12
Mary Daheim
“Great,” Mike replied. “You know my girl, she’s a
hardy honey.”
“Hardy” wasn’t quite the word Judith would have
chosen. “Robust,” perhaps, or even “brawny.” Kristin
McMonigle was a Viking, or maybe a Valkyrie. Mike’s
wife was big, blonde, and beautiful. She was also constrained, conscientious, and capable. Almost too capable, it seemed to Judith. Kristin could repair a
transmission, build a cabinet, bake a Viennese torte,
shingle a roof, and balance a checkbook to the penny.
Indeed, Judith sometimes found her daughter-in-law
intimidating.
“I’m so thrilled,” Judith enthused. “I can’t wait to
tell Joe. And Granny.”
“That reminds me,” Mike said, “could you call
Grandma Effie, too? I don’t like making out-of-state
calls on the phone in the office. I’d call her from the
cabin tonight, but I’m putting on a slide show for some
zoologists.”
“Of course,” Judith said with only a slight hesitation. “I’ll call right now.”
“Thanks, Mom. Got to run. By the way, good luck
Monday if I don’t talk to you before you go to the hospital.”
Judith clicked the phone off and reached for her address book on the kitchen counter. She ought to know
Effie McMonigle’s number by heart, but she didn’t.
Ever since Dan’s death eleven years earlier, Judith had
called his mother once a month. But somehow the
number wouldn’t stick in her brain. Maybe it was like
Gertrude not speaking directly to Joe; maybe Judith
hoped that if she kept forgetting Effie’s number, her
former mother-in-law would go away, too, and take all
the unhappy memories of Dan with her.
SUTURE SELF
13
Effie was home. She usually was. A nurse by profession, she resided in a retirement community outside
Phoenix. In the nineteen years that Judith and Dan had
been married, Effie had visited only three times—once
for the wedding, once when Mike was born, and once
for Dan’s funeral. Effie was a sun-worshiper. She
couldn’t stand the Pacific Northwest’s gray skies and
rainy days. She claimed to become depressed. But Judith felt Effie was always depressed—and depressing.
Sunshine didn’t seem to improve her pessimistic
attitude.
“Another baby?” Effie exclaimed when Judith relayed the news. “So soon? Oh, what bad planning!”
“But Mac will be two in June,” Judith put in. “The
