Oblivious to the event or on the brink of a genuine religious conversion.

And even if my voice goes before I do, I shall continue to write polemics against religious delusions, at least until it’s hello darkness my old friend. In which case, why not cancer of the brain? As a terrified, half-aware imbecile, I might even scream for a priest at the close of business, though I hereby state while I am still lucid that the entity thus humiliating itself would not in fact be “me.” (Bear this in mind, in case of any later rumors or fabrications.)

Coming offstage after a five-minute standing ovation, falling into the arms of my lover, and having the doctor look at me and say, “This is impossible! She looks much too young to go!”

Like Joel McCrea’s character at the end of the movie Ride the High Country. (He says something about “entering his house justified,” sits up to take a last look at the scenery, then rolls contentedly out of the frame.) Or like Bill Nighy’s character at the end of our film Living.

A balmy, moonlit evening in Key West. George and I are enjoying a pasta dinner on the balcony overlooking the ocean. Ella Fitzgerald is singing in the background.

My phobias. I’m down to two, so I take that as a positive sign.

That we’re going down the tubes as a country (make that the whole world).

I love that my true friends don’t think of me as that Judy, but as the Judy they’ve known for years, a woman, like them. And I love their senses of humor.