Her eyes are the eyes of a woman in love.

My Mom smiles, and looks off into the distant past. I asked her to tell me again how she and Dad met. Her voice ebbs and flows, halting occasionally as she remembers people and conversations from her college days, then spilling out again with a laugh. The story is a very wandering path, twisting, turning back on itself, reiterating. Her hands are mostly quite in her lap. Sometimes she lifts them up to illustrate a point. She flicks her wrist, as if playing frisbee with her beret and him. They are elegant hands, slender and refined, I've always envied them. Her ring sparkles in the lamplight. Her eyes mirror it with brilliant flashes of their own. She closes them from time to time, recalling faces long filed away. Sometimes she frowns, thinking of things she regrets, or wishes she had done differently. But mostly her words are full of love. I listen, and I yearn for the joy she has.