My grandmother Steffani passed away this week.

She lived a long, fascinating life and went exactly as she chose to; privately and quietly. She’s always regaled me with stories of what she was up to before I was born — childhood modeling, teaching in NYC, dating mobsters, working in adult entertainment co-ops, and more — but even when I knew her, she was always up to something. Lively, opinionated, determined and truly cultured in a way I can only envy.

Even in her last handful of years on Earth, she volunteered to guard women getting abortions from abusive protesters, helped save sea birds, fostered cats and dogs and did live audio descriptions of musicals for blind people to enjoy over the radio.

I was last with her for just a few short months in 2016, quite soon before I left for New Zealand. I hope that the memories she has of me during this time are even half as good as the memories I have of her. I never saw her in person again, but I know that she saw me and saw my beautiful wife and that she was able to watch a video of our wedding from afar.

Steffani was also, as you’d expect, not without her challenging qualities. She did not tell my mother or I that she even had a terminal illness until she about to go. She was brutally honest, often unemotional, sometimes deeply critical. It was a fear of this criticism that, shamefully, led me to put off recording a final video message for her until it was too late. This is everything I was going to say:

Something will always make me think of you.

When I see a Maine Coone like Emma or a Yorkie like Misha, I’ll think of you.

When I eat good seafood. When I order Chinese for Christmas. When I see Botero or hear Yo-Yo Ma.

When I go to a good musical. When I go to a bad musical, and laugh about it.

When I write in sentence fragments. You’d have something to say about that.

I’ll likely think of you in present tense. My grandmother likes… My grandmother thinks… My grandmother is…

And why not? I have not begun to mourn.