Life Goes On . . .

My mother and I haven't always understood each other so well, but we had the simplest of exchanges one time not long ago. We had just finished a rambling conversation about the bad old times with her and my father. A definite pause followed before I spoke again, and I said:

"Life goes on."

To which my mother replied:

"It really does."

And that simple interchange of views seemed somehow to summon up a universe deep with meaning that we both implicitly understood, so we said no more.