joan:
“it took me almost a century to discover how little i’d done with my life. my middle name held me back, for sure, but i couldn’t blame my misfortune on that alone. i would have to find another culprit. i thought of that rabid dog i met on my eighth birthday and how, on the verge of tears, i’d begged it to bite my leg and it refused. but i know, in my recycled heart, that the alsatian was only the beginning of my problems. i blame, also, the elderly gentleman who refused to rob me in newport pagnell. and the harm he did was nothing compared to the adolescent funeral director who insisted on taking my pulse. yes – i am quite sure that if i were lucky enough to suffer some grave injustice, i may have spent my time on this earth doing more than stitching epigrams on kitchen towels.”
