WHEN MY 59-YEAR-OLD NEIGHBOR KNOCKED AT MIDNIGHT, I THOUGHT I WAS FIXING A PIPE, BUT I WAS REALLY SAVING MY OWN LIFE…

how after the funeral she stopped leaving the house until a pipe burst and forced her to call a repairman. I understood then why this recent disaster had shaken her so deeply. It had not just been a flood. It had reopened the locked front door of an older grief.

“I was afraid,” she said, looking out at the street, “that after Robert died, no one would continue reading …