Some day maybe, a young woman will remember running with her sister across a garden and licking “new jam” off a wooden spoon. “New jam,” she said. “You make it with the plums.” A fact. Then she jumps around. Shyness is no longer an issue. I tell her to stay away from the hot stove.

The grandmother wanders in and out. I don’t know what she was like before the fourteen surgeries, the infected morphine pump and the rest of the medical saga. I know her mind runs in a loop, these days.  Has the préfecture received her medical file yet, she asks. Five minutes later, she’s back and asks again. Then wants to teach me how to make jam. The instructions are in Armenian and Russian. They can’t be much different from what I learned in French and in English.

The joke when friends lent us this place during their holidays? We said I’d use it as a writer-in-residence program. I’d forgotten about the ways of small children and sick old people. Now I remember why writing  happened in dribs and drabs, way back when.

A woman comes by with offerings of food for the family. Wants more information about them and why they don’t stand much of a chance in their appeal. I explain in the broadest of terms. Her response surprises me: “then, we mustn’t invest too much in them,” she says. Meaning emotional investment since the financial aspect doesn’t come into play, in her case.

If by emotional investment she meant a sentimental attachment of the mi casa es tu casa variety for the long haul, she’s right, I suppose. But I don’t much care if they are “deserving” or not. For one, the kids are kids, in need of food, shelter and emotional stability of some kind. For another, the parents have major challenges to face. I can’t solve their problems but, for a limited time, I can help make the space available for them to reach their own decisions. They’ll be heart-wrenching ones because they have no happily-ever-after  options open to them. If heart-wrenching decisions don’t make people “deserving” of basic consideration, I don’t know what does.

More plums to cook down but they can wait till tomorrow. Tonight, we organize all the papers for tomorrow’s visit to the lawyer.