Book excerpt: Ring around the Rosie A pocket full of posies, Ashes! Ashes! We all fall down! As a little girl growing up singing Ring Around the Rosie, little did I know, that this would become our family ballad. My maternal grandpa used to say, "One day this family will destroy itself!" How could I possibly understand what that meant? But I remember him saying it, all the same. Grandpa's prediction now rings true, as our family did destroy itself and fell to the ashes with the final act of our mother's passing. She left a carefully woven Gordian knot through deceptive means in her death wake of such vast proportion and complexity that it may never unravel. The death and passing of a loved one is difficult, even under the best of circumstances. But if the ties that bind left behind unaddressed confusion, misunderstandings, and/or deceit, the pain can run deep and leave a lasting "nonnegotiable" imprint, limited not to just one member, but the entire family for generations to come.