In which we part

i just had a very strange experience. my uncle stephen posted a video of himself feeding a corn on the cob to a cow. and he captioned it saying that he was dedicating the video to his sweet niece, c, who loved cows. and i read this. and puzzled over it, asking myself who his sweet niece was that loved cows. her name was right there, c, and still i was asking myself who that was. i wondered if his ex-wife had a niece i did not know about, which is possible because our families are not close. but c was my sister. why did it take me a minute to catch up to that fact? because i did not think of her as someone with a particular fondness for cows? because i did not think of her as "sweet"? because she has been dead almost 12 years and doesn't sit at the top of my conscious thoughts anymore? it was like saying goodbye again. a little punch in the gut. goodbye sweet c who loved cows. goodbye from my brain. (my heart still remembers you.) *