My mother had written from Gila and said she had received permission to visit me for a month. She arrived a week after our son was born. She was a shock to behold. I had not seen her for two years and she was as thin as a rail, her skin just covering her frame. Her once beautiful skin was weatherbeaten. We cried on each other’s shoulders and she said in her quiet way she was thin only because she couldn’t take the oppressive heat and her appetite was nil because the food was so miserable. We spent the night talking, catching up with the news of the family. In the morning after breakfast, she attempted to carry a bucket of hot water from the washroom to our apartment to bathe the babies and could not carry it, and I determined she was seriously ill. She had all intentions of assisting me after the birth, but in reality it was her last goodbye. She refused to see the medics at Topaz and was busy daily, visiting former church members and old friends.
