In the middle of church Mom looked up from a hymn she knows by heart—All creatures of our God and King, lift up your voice and with us sing— and craned her fragile-looking head this way and that to scan the crowd.

Even with her pale nearsighted eyes, from a wheelchair that cradles and cushions her head, Mom is observant. She notes the strange, poignant, incongruous and unfamiliar.

I followed her gaze then turned back to the hymn, moved by the line: All you that pain and sorrow bear, praise God and cast on him your care.

After church I push her wheelchair to coffee hour. Unwilling to push her long new wheelchair up to a round table full of independent walkers and eaters who can banter easily, we sat alone. But I turned her chair so she could see the action. And in the midst of a painstakingly slow bite of zucchini bread dipped in hot coffee, she spotted a cluster of people at a nearby table.

“Who’s that?” she whispered, all pain and sorrow cast aside.

Don’t be a nosy parker, I thought, reflexively, even though I was just myself, thinking, “Who’s that?” It was a woman in a blue shirt, holding court at a nearby table, a new face in the room.

Mom’s incessant curiosity about people often irked me growing up and seemed to know no bounds—she’d chat with the cashier or the cab driver and ask them questions about their kids and spouses—and so I changed the subject, and said, conversationally, “I went to Norway last month, Mom.”

“No kidding!” Now she turned her blue-green-eyed gaze on me. This was gratifying because she loves Norway and I know she was happy for me, but then she added, in what might be considered a pout if her Parkinson’s allowed for that much affect, “And I didn’t even know about it.”

I felt a pang of guilt. Mom likes to know what’s up, to be included.

Perhaps the reason her curiosity bothered me as a kid, was that it worried me—did she somehow not feel connected to other people? And maybe that’s why I resist acting on curiosity myself although it’s usually irresistible and of course necessary for my work. Mom is so inquisitive and curious I sometimes think she can read my private thoughts— or did my private thoughts developed in the pattern of her voice?

Whichever way it happened, why resist it now? Observation, even if nosy-parker-ish, at times, is a sign of interest in life. It’s also a terrific asset for a writer.