“Help Papa get off oxygen,” my toddler prays each night for my father. Before Papa’s Covid-19 hospitalization, my son was admitted with pneumonia. Only 2, he knows the prick of needles, the web of tubes, the tickle of plastic in the nostrils. “That itch your nose,” he said to Papa sympathetically. On July 4, we avoided crowded firework displays to watch amateur shows from the porch of my parents’ rural West Virginia home. The sun set, bats swooped, the sky exploded with color. My son and father held each other as they marveled at light in the darkness. — Anna Rollins

Positively Purging-I welcome your feedbacks in the comments and your likes and passing the real life wisdom on to others as I embark on this new venture of “positively purging“, as I know each of these pieces represents something…