We couldn't possibly get a grandmother in our own family. My mom was still working on her retirement plan. My husband's mother was a grand dame, socialite and full-time Londoner. There was no way she could fit two teenage girls in her schedule between lunch with the Prime Minister and dinner with Rupert Murdoch. That's why Larissa, being an old Jewish lady, fit right into our puzzle.

Entering our home, I received a doggy attack from Elvis. Forgetting that he had begged me out of my breakfast this morning, this source of eternal love jumped and slobbered all over me.

"Rachel!" Larissa summoned me to the kitchen. "I think the girls are upset with each other. Something happened in school. They don't want to tell me what. As a mother, I think you should talk to them."

As a mother, I would rather have a cup of coffee right now, especially seeing Larissa sitting at the table with her cup of Earl Grey and biscuits. Of course, I didn't say that. Alexander thought that the European system of rearing children was superior to the American. In his eyes, Larissa, after teaching English at some schools in Moscow, Berlin, and New York for thirty years, was an embodiment of this system. I went to the entrance hall and shouted for the girls at the top of my lungs. I knew it was a no-no, but I would rather have the girls come down to the kitchen, than walk up to their rooms. Frankly, it is healthy for kids to get in a fight now and then, because this way they build up their conflict-solving muscles for future adult life.

First, Iris showed up with a thunder of heavy footfalls. She was taller than the other eleven-year-olds, with long blonde hair and dark brown eyes.

"Mom," she crashed into a chair with a moan. "When is dinner? I'm starving."

I took her words about starvation with a great deal of healthy doubt, looking at her slightly bulging tummy and peach-like cheeks, but Larissa sprang into action. She turned to me with her well-groomed head with a strawberry blonde hairdo and offered to feed the child with something healthy.

"A couple of spoons of nonfat cottage cheese with a bit of sour cream will do her just fine before dinner," she let me know.

"Sour cream? Yuck." My sweet angel made a retching sound.

"What is so yucky?" Evana asked, entering the kitchen with a quiet grace of hers. She was my daughter's age, but shorter, slimmer, with dark brown hair and bright blue eyes.

"Mom wants us to have cottage cheese for a snack. Can you imagine?"

Evana considered the news for a moment. "Well, it might not be that bad," she said flatly.

I opened the fridge, found a tub of cottage cheese tucked away in the door compartment, and sniffed it. It looked fresh to me, but I tasted it, just in case.

"It's not even sour," I announced after taking a bite. "Tastes kind of chalky, but this is the healthy part, I guess." I spooned the white substance into tiny ice cream bowls for the girls.

"Mom," Iris looked at me with alarm. "Where did you get this jar?"

"In the fridge… No talking, just eat and go. We have to cook dinner."

"Mom," Iris insisted. "Show me the jar."

I showed her.

"Ah, this is not the cottage cheese. This is my dough clay, for my science project."

Somehow, eating clay gave me a burst of energy, because I stayed in the kitchen to help Mark, my British cook, to make turkey soup. I have my special way of cooking turkey soup, which I invented while living in Center City and driving a cab. This soup, like any other great invention, came into existence by accident and lack of resources. It was the day after Halloween, and Iris had overdone it with sweets. Her stomach hurt, so she stayed home from school. I did a six-hour shift and went home. The best treatment for stomach sickness is chicken soup, no doubt about it, but we had only turkey breast. I found two potatoes, a tomato, a white onion, a red bell pepper, and moldy spaghetti squash. Cooking a vegetable stew, I saut,ed chopped onion and pieces of turkey in olive oil. Then I dropped in tiny slices of bell pepper, potatoes, squash and tomato, and I poured some water to top the stew. I let the soup cook slowly for two hours on medium heat; finally, I just added a little garlic and soy sauce to it.