Here's an excerpt from Jeffe's website:
EDITOR'S NOTE: Jeffe is a recipient of a WAC creative writing fellowship and a Blanchan/Doubleday writing award. She's also featured on the WAC Artist Roster. You can bring her to your community for a reading, workshop or presentation through an Arts Across Wyoming grant. FMI: http://wyoarts.state.wy.us/artistroster0809/artistroster.htm#kennedyFor the first time in my life, I could not decorate for Christmas. It almost makes me weep to type the words, yet I could not bear to pull out one strand of lights. Once David convinced me to cancel our annual extravagant party, because I was too fragile for the additional pressure of cleaning and decorating and cooking, I had thought I might do simple things as the mood struck me. Perhaps I'd decorate our six-foot bougainvillea with some of the pearl lights our guests admired every year, perhaps add the clear glass balls I bought just a few weeks ago, with an eye towards replacing the tatty gold and red satin ones. But I couldn't do even that little. Our friends are
understanding of our canceled party - even the ones to whom I'd given invitations already, then reneged. They're disappointed - "You know your party is the event of my Season," said one - but supportive. I feel like I've let my neighbors down, with our dark house and invisible trees. But all you have to tell people is that your dad - though they may know the relationship hasn't always been an easy one - is dying and they forgive you any breaches.
But I have a Christmas secret I dare not speak aloud: Leo has chosen to die. He picked out the date.
