Once I got through Everything is Illuminated I kept trying to build up a Book of Antecedents in my head. Or a book of something else, a book of remembrances in any case, and then it struck me that I don't remember her much anymore.

The pleasantest memory I have is based entirely on peripheral vision, lying on a mattress being ordered to take an afternoon nap, having my head thumped with all the anticipation of not having a bothersome kid around for a few hours. Flump flump. Stroke flump. I'm trying, can't you see I'm trying? I close my eyes till everything forms that strange shape when you're seeing through slits, your nose a slight bump, and then the rest of the world. It's probably because my nose is more of a bump than other noses, but beyond the bump is a hand, a brown hand with gold bangles on it, and you can tell it was once a beautiful hand. I never thought her beautiful or even once-beautiful but the hand has blue-green veins standing up all over it, fluid mountain ranges that you can jiggle around with a finger. Which is what I did, pushing and nudging every vein till sleep came every afternoon, looking for knots and intersections and branches and things, trying to make them meet, and it's creepy how some things remind me of those veins still, really dry Maggi and centipedes and Buddhist knots and paint coming out of baby-sized paint tubes. Of course I don't think I'm eating veins when I'm eating Maggi, that's just sick, but it happens sometimes. Just a passing thought, but that is all there is and that is the nicest thing I remember.

I noticed something similar happening with my hands, they're not beautiful or anything, just hands, but when I'm older and wrinkled I will have gnarly veins rising out of the wrinkles too. It's ok, I'll sleep easier.