Blossom

From author Regina Gerstman comes a sensitive portrait of an elder who enters the last nine months of her life. Gerstman was invited into the mysterious and metaphysical world of Blossom Flowers Ford Burns through private meetings at her studio house in Austin, Texas. As Blossom navigates the tasks of living alone after receiving a terminal diagnosis, Gerstman reaped the rewards of an intellectual friendship stoked with reading assignments, introductions to important friends, co-hosting a neighborhood meeting, and a peek into a private prayer room. Written in sixteen picturesque chapters of their encounters, Gerstman's rendering of a brilliant woman in decline is intimate and compelling. A session of singing with Blossom's childhood boyfriend ends in a small banquet. There is a brief interlude at hospice from which Blossom recovers. She unexpectedly contributes a final gift to her community. People of all ages and faith traditions have something to glean from this stoic and proud march towards her final days. So many want to die at home in our time; this story displays the Eastern philosophy Blossom used to show how it is done.