My mother wasn’t perfect. My mother was intense. Things didn’t happen because they were possible, they happened because she decided they would. She once fit a couch through a door frame that was several inches too small simply by pushing with all her strength and saying, “Couch, go in!” But, as anyone who has read a fairy tale knows, all spells come with a cost. The magic pulled on hidden sources. My brother referred to her exertion of will as “the fireball technique.” She could set the universe aflame, but she used herself as fuel. Somewhere inside, the earth was scorched.
