After years of skirting the issue it was my four-year-old who was the one person I could no longer hide my past from. "Where's your Mommy?" he asked. This was not the first time he'd gone down this road. After all, his other grandmother, my husband's mother, is a vibrant character in our family portrait, constantly abounding with energy and creative ideas for how to spend the day. Next to her, the hole where my mother should be is even more gaping. I knew I had to come up with an answer that I could stand behind, not a diversionary technical-truth.