Missed bootcamp yesterday for a funeral of a friend's mother. A different kind of workout. Exercising the mind to find just the right words to say and just the right things to feel. Impossible.

Always tragic, never timely, funerals reinforce mortality. Not that I needed any reminders. After having lived more than four decades, I get it. It goes by quickly and ends in a snap.

So what's it all for? Mental exercise indeed. I'm beginning to think bootcamp isn't so hard after all. In fact, it's rather simple. Attend for an hour, do whatever the trainer says, then return home to collapse. No thinking required.

Only this time, I can't collapse. I have to return home to make a pecan torte for Thanksgiving dinner. My little contribution, oozing with calories and laden with fat. Hopefully all that sweetness will help me forget about living and dying. Or maybe...just maybe...it'll explain what it's all for.