This morning my mother and I went to see my father. He had no idea who we were. On a few occasions, he looked at me a tad suspiciously, too. As always, my mother brought him a pile of things to eat, which she arranged on a table in front of him: grapes, nuts, prunes, bananas. All the time we were with him, he ate and ate. “Do you want a grape?” she would ask. “Yes,” he would nod. “Do you want another prune?” she would ask. “No,” he would nod. Bereft of memory and articulate speech, he can reward his visitors by eating. His last gift.