I think I miss my mom most on rainy days. Like today. It's quiet in my office. She didn't particularly love the rain -- though she always seemed to have nice umbrellas -- it's just that I get to feeling nostalgic and maybe a little sad sometimes when the skies are gray and my mind wanders. The agency I work for -- the National Endowment for the Arts -- and one of our literature programs -- the Big Read -- recently made the New York Times crossword puzzle. My parents did that puzzle every Sunday. My mom would take it upstairs, fill in a quarter of it, fall asleep maybe, then my dad would take it into the kitchen, crack the big clue, then back and forth like that until they finished it. "Did you see what dad got?" I can hear her say if I was there. "I would never have figured that out." And yet she was kind of amazing in what she did get -- far more than I ever got. I think I only finished the Sunday puzzle once in my life, and I'm pretty sure I cheated. She would have come across the NEA in this recent puzzle and called me immediately to tell me I made the big time. Last week her voice came to me again when I had my annual checkup with my ob/gyn. For the last several years I always called her after my appointments because there was always something to report about my pregnancies and babies or questions to ask about what runs in our family and what she's experienced so that I can know what to expect. The first time I had a mammogram a few years ago I nearly passed out from the pain. I had talked to her that morning beforehand and all she had to say was, "have fun." "Have fun?!?" I cried out when I called her minutes after I left the doctor's office. "Why didn't you warn me?" "Because why should you worry?" she said, and then she laughed. She actually laughed. "Not funny," I think I said, laughing myself. If you knew my mom and how much she worried about things like that in her own life, you can appreciate the irony. I'm wearing her earrings today, and one of her sweaters. She had nice sweaters, lots of cashmere. I like being enveloped in something that enveloped her. I like talking to her and imagining she's talking back. "It's raining out, mom," I would say. "That must mean the rain's going to be here soon," she'd say, gauging her weather in NY by mine in Washington. "You can have the rain." "Thanks. Send some sun, too, when you get a chance." Will do, mom.