In Each Man's Heart There Lies A

It's Special, Grandparents And Grandchldren. So Much Simpler. Is It Always So, I Wonder? I Think Perhaps It Is. While One's Child Takes A Part Of One's Heart To Use And Misuse As They Please, A Grandchild Is Different. Gone Are The Bonds Of Guilt And Responsibility That Burden The Maternal Relationship. The Way To Love Is Free.

To Abandon A Child, She Had Once Said To Someone, When She Thought Cassandra Couldn't Hear, Was An Act So Cold, So Careless, It Refused Forgiveness.

Cassandra Wondered At The Mind's Cruel Ability To Toss Up Flecks Of The Past. Why, As She Neared Her Life's End, Her Grandmother's Head Should Ring With The Voices Of People Long Since Gone. Was It Always This Way? Did Those With Passage Booked On Death's Silent Ship Always Scan The Dock For Faces Of The Long-departed?

She Either Confused Me With A Much Older Child Or Else She Glimpsed Deep Inside My Soul And Perceived A Hole That Needed Filling. I've Always Chosen To Believe The Latter. After All, It's The Librarian's One Sworn Purpose To Bring Books Together With Their One True Reader.

I Sound Contemptuous, But I Am Not. I Am Interested--intrigued Even--by The Way Time Erases Real Lives, Leaving Only Vague Imprints. Blood And Spirit Fade Away So That Only Names And Dates Remain.