“You’ll say it’s really good to see you / you’ll say I missed you horribly / you’ll say let me carry that, give that to me / and you will take the heavy stuff / and you will drive the car / and I’ll look out the window & make jokes about the way things are.”

I still haven’t yet stopped thinking in the third-person! Here are what some of my recent status updates would be, were I still “using” Facebook:

Bess Jankowski apologizes for joking about having a heart attack earlier, because now she actually might legitimately be having one.

Bess Jankowski is sad that nobody will advise her on what to do with her life.

Bess Jankowski’s sister has perfected the psychological device (”Withholding,” maybe?) of expertly, unflinchingly conveying ZERO reaction when someone tells you something they specifically NEED you to react to.

Bess Jankowski: Please don’t let me be dying, please don’t let me be dying, please don’t let me be dying, Archbishoptimothydolan PLEASE.

Bess Jankowski will stroll the merry way, jumping hedges first. And she shall drink the clear clean water for to quench her thirst.

Bess Jankowski’s dinner this evening consists of a bag of Combos from Duane Reade.

That last one was just a little while ago, actually. I spent the day catching up with family I don’t get to see often enough, and the whole thing was as bittersweetly life-affirming as such gatherings in the wake of tragedy routinely, cruelly are. It was so fulfilling I forgot I hadn’t really eaten anything until now.

My cousins and I have reached a consensus: we all need to start spending more time together aside from at funerals.

And I have come to the conclusion, after first one of the very oldest, and now the one very youngest of the twenty grandchildren of our Jankowski Generation have died in their sleep in their twenties, nearly twenty years apart?

No more of us are allowed to die.

At least not for twenty more years, thanks.