At seventy, after suffering several disappointments, the first being my mother, the second being me, my father died. One evening he gathered the family in his room and asked if anyone had any questions. No one did. The next day he died. At the funeral everyone looked like someone I might sort of know. These strangers told anecdotes and made general health suggestions to each other. I passed out the sandwiches. The sandwiches were clingfilmed and oddly perforated, like they had been pierced again and again by cocktail sticks. I said ‘Sambo?’ to every single person in that room. It was a good word, a word I hoped would get me through the entire evening.