In the autoethnographic "Spinach Lasagna", the narrator joins a family of southern Italians and learns that grieving is cultural.
"She has been so careful at work; she has had all of her shopping delivered for weeks, actually for months, now; she's even wiped down the items with bleach as they are delivered, and still does. How can this have happened?"
"At friends’ homes and the inexpensive trattorias where I usually ate, there was always wine and water on the table, but often only one glass."
"My parents drank wine with dinner every night. There’s nothing remarkable about that, but to a kid growing up in Mid-Missouri it was weird."
