A pivotal point to the insight of the story comes when the wife after going on a yelling rampage tells her husband "If only there were instant sleep" (33). The aspect of the wife's illness begins to take shape with her words to the husband

The mothers preoccupation with her illness is noted when telling her husband "the girl upsets me" referring to the girl hired to help with the child. Here the hired girl represents youth and vitality with which the wife detests and consequential she fires the girl. The wife's present absence of youth and vitality is realized by seeing the girl and knowing "now the days were too short" (36) she awoke at the crack of dawn and "her fingers raced the hours" (36). The wife become conscious of her final days and wanted to leave a positive message of her own as her time came to close. She had made an assortment of food and clean laundry before drinking her concoction of cognac and a dark liquid. When the husband and the child returned home "the house smelled redolently of renewal and spring" (37), which symbolized the wife's passing and the beginning of a new life for the husband who turned his life upside down to be with

Some common words found in the essay are:
Sorrowful Woman, dark liquid, Gail Godwin's, glass dark liquid, glass dark, youth vitality, short story, final stage, sorrowful woman, terminal illness, husband child, instant sleep,
Approximate Word count = 621
Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)