On March 12 of last year, my mother informed my brother and I that she had cancer. I remember the setting with such clarity and precision that it seems somehow unreal: a figment of an overactive imagination. It was an early Spring day, unseasonably warm and bright. The birds in our backyard seemed chirpier than ever. It was one of those days when the world seems waiting to be reborn. The promise and potential of the day and the season only served to heighten the unreality of what my mother was trying to convey.