The summer I turned fourteen, I spent a month at the Lake Erie resort town of Cedar Point, with a friend whose parents ran a food concession on the boardwalk, which boasted the highest roller coaster in Ohio. It was called The Thriller and I fell in love with it. I hung around it so much that the daytime manager, seeing my passion, eventually allowed me to ride for free in the mornings, when there weren't many customers. One day I decided to see how many consecutive rides I could clock without stopping and rode for two and a half hours straight. Even so, the thrill of the slow clank to the top followed by the heart-stopping plunge to the bottom continued unabated.

After I had children of my own, my reckless daring gradually disappeared until they could not induce me to accompany them on the big rides, or eventually the small ones either, until finally I swore off all of them-a not uncommon side effect of responsibility. Now I wonder if my youthful fearlessness and love of danger didn't somehow prepare me to deal with the traumatic brain injury my dear husband suffered more than half a century later, that left him like someone with advanced Alzheimer's. Dealing with his accident (a fall from a sleeping loft) involved a similar extreme alternation of anticipation, tension, terror, and relief. With Scott himself no longer capable of either hope or dread, I took the ride for us both, clutching the sides, holding my breath, screaming as we fell, hanging on for dear life, bracing for the next slow uphill climb.