One of the grubby truths about a loss is that you don't just mourn the dead person, you mourn the person you got to be when the lost one was alive. This loss might even be what affects you the most.

If the condition of grief is nearly universal, its transactions are exquisitely personal.

There is always tension in women's gymnastics between athleticism, grace, performance, and eros.

Be patient with yourself. Don't make the loss harder by thinking you should be a certain way, or have bounced back, etc.

I envy my Jewish friends the ritual of saying kaddish - a ritual that seems perfectly conceived, with its built-in support group and its ceremonious designation of time each day devoted to remembering the lost person.

My theory is this: Women falter when they're called on to be highly self-conscious about their talents. Not when they're called on to enact them.

Loss doesn't feel redeemable. But for me one consoling aspect is the recognition that, in this at least, none of us is different from anyone else: We all lose loved ones; we all face our own death.