Summary

In the story “Self-Reliance,” Cornelia Finch learned her cancer had come back. She went to her cottage beside the spring fed pond in New Hampshire that she’d bought for herself when she retired. She knew what she faced with her new case of cancer. She’d mixed up pain and sleeping pills into a cocktail in her thermos that she took with her when she went for a ride in her canoe. She drank the cocktail as she floated on the pond. As she died she imagined her canoe had gone over a waterfall. She imagined a group of people in evening clothes, those who had died before her. She saw visions of her life including the birth of her daughter. She was hugged by Aunt Shelley, her favorite aunt. Even though she wanted to stay in Aunt Shelley’s forgiving hug, Cornelia...