A backpack to keep

I was in class when I learned my grandmother, Oma, was approaching the end of her life. I left class in horror. Naturally, I was terribly sad for a night or two but I thought back to conversations with her when I was 15 years old, 14, 10. She was at peace with her life. She had an extensive history about her, children and grandchildren and she left many stories.

I’m not sentimental generally but I kept several of her things, if only because she was so practical that she would dread things gone to waste. Most of the things I kept were just neat, a dishtowel with a recipe on it from Tahiti that...