CALLING MY parents on Sunday mornings is a ritual. I rang them at the break of dawn. They were both up early, probably talking over coffee and breakfast in preparation for the Sunday worship service.
At 6 am, my father would shine his shoes, take a quick shower, and don his best clothes, a ritual he ends with a spray of perfume behind his ears. He'd eventually find himself frustrated at my mother's leisurely stroll in her small garden, where she would literally uproot shrubs and transplant them elsewhere, something she does on a regular basis. She forgets that plants need to be rooted, quite literally, and are not movable like our dog Benjamin who, if left alone, will travel to as far as Ethiopia.
