My mother ha no idea that her ninetieth birthday i coming up. She ha no notion of the time of day, the day of the week. the eaon of the year, the year of the century. No notion of the approaching millennium. And no idea any longer, who I am. Her forgetting of me happened jut a few month ago, after I had been traveling for more than a month and hadn't been to ee her. When I came back, he aked me if I were her niece, l aid no, I wa her daughter. "Doe that mean I had you?" he aked. 1 aid ye. "Where wa I when l had you?" he aked me. I told her he wa in a hopital in Far Rockaway. New York. "So much ha happened to me in my life." he aid "You can't expect me to remember everything."