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@media (min-width: 71.25em) { .content__main-column–interactive { margin-left: 160px; } }
@media (min-width: 81.25em) { .content__main-column–interactive { margin-left: 240px; } }
.content__main-column–interactive .element-atom { max-width: 620px; }
@media (max-width: 46.24em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-atom { max-width: 100%; } }
.content__main-column–interactive .element-showcase { margin-left: 0; }
@media (min-width: 46.25em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-showcase { max-width: 620px; } }
@media (min-width: 71.25em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-showcase { max-width: 860px; } }
.content__main-column–interactive .element-immersive { max-width: 1100px; }
@media (max-width: 46.24em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-immersive { width: calc(100vw – var(–scrollbar-width, 0px)); position: relative; left: 50%; right: 50%; margin-left: calc(-50vw + var(–half-scrollbar-width, 0px)) !important; margin-right: calc(-50vw + var(–half-scrollbar-width, 0px)) !important; } }
@media (min-width: 46.25em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-immersive { transform: translate(-20px); width: calc(100% + 60px); } }
@media (max-width: 71.24em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-immersive { margin-left: 0; margin-right: 0; } }
@media (min-width: 71.25em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-immersive { transform: translate(0); width: auto; } }
@media (min-width: 81.25em) { .content__main-column–interactive .element-immersive { max-width: 1260px; } }
.content__main-column–interactive p, .content__main-column–interactive ul { max-width: 620px; }
.content__main-column–interactive:before { position: absolute; top: 0; height: calc(100% + 15px); min-height: 100px; content: “”; }
@media (min-width: 71.25em) {The main content column for interactive articles has a left border of 1px solid #dcdcdc, positioned at -10px with a z-index of -1. On screens at least 81.25em wide, this border shifts to -11px. Atom elements inside this column have no top or bottom margin, but 12px of padding on top and bottom. When a paragraph is followed by an atom element, the padding is removed and replaced with 12px margins instead. Inline elements are capped at 620px wide, and on screens at least 61.25em wide, inline figures also max out at 620px.
For media elements containing a looping figure, the figcaption sits above other content with a z-index of 6. The video loop button aligns to the bottom right with a 40px bottom margin and 3px right margin. The mute and unmute control containers are positioned at the right edge with 10px of left padding. The caption button has a z-index of 100, and on screens at least 61.25em wide, it sits 20px from the bottom. On screens at least 46.25em wide, cinemagraph containers have no maximum height.
Self-hosted video islands in the body are full-width up to 620px, displayed as blocks with 12px top and bottom margins. Their looping figures and videos are also full-width up to 620px, centered with no margin. When the video is immersive, the island expands to full width with 12px vertical margins, and the figure and video lose their width limits. On screens at least 71.25em wide, the immersive island becomes 1140px wide and shifts 180px to the left, with figcaptions indented 20px. On screens at least 81.25em wide, it becomes 1300px wide and shifts 260px to the left.
The root defines several color variables: dateline (#606060), header border (#dcdcdc), caption text (#999), caption background (72% opaque near-black), feature color (#c70000), and a new pillar colour that defaults to the primary pillar or feature color. Subheadings, pullquotes, and pullquote icons use the secondary pillar color, while blockquotes use the article text color with a secondary pillar fill. In dark mode (unless the user has explicitly chosen light mode), subheadings, pullquotes, and their icons switch to the dark mode pillar color, and blockquotes use that same color for their fill.
Atom elements have no padding. When an atom element is the first of its type and is followed by a paragraph, sign-in gate, another atom, or similar, the following paragraph gets special spacing. The same applies after a horizontal rule that isn’t the last one, or after an ad slot container followed by a paragraph.The text you’ve provided is CSS code, not prose, so there’s no natural English version of it. It’s a set of style rules that:
– Add 14px of top padding to the first paragraph that follows certain elements (like the first atom element, a sign-in gate, or a horizontal rule that isn’t the last one) within various containers such as the article body, comment body, feature body, and interactive content areas.
– Apply a first-letter style to those same paragraphs.
If you’d like, I can explain what specific parts of the selector do, or help you rewrite or simplify the CSS itself.I can’t rewrite that text as fluent English. It’s not prose—it’s a block of CSS code (selectors, properties, and media queries). Rewriting it as natural English would either break the code or turn it into a description rather than a rewrite.
If you’d like, I can:
– Explain what this CSS does in plain English
– Clean up or reformat the CSS itself
– Rewrite a prose passage you share
Let me know which you’d prefer.This CSS code defines a responsive layout for article headers, headlines, metadata, standfirsts, and portraits. It uses CSS Grid to arrange these elements across different screen sizes, with breakpoints at 61.25em, 71.25em, and 81.25em. The layout adjusts column and row structures, adds borders, and styles links and figures accordingly..furniture-wrapper #standfirst:before,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=standfirst]:before{left:-.5px}}.furniture-wrapper .article-header .content__labels>div,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=title] .content__labels>div{padding-top:2px}.furniture-wrapper #headline h1,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=headline] h1,.furniture-wrapper .headline h1{font-weight:600;max-width:620px;font-size:32px}@media (min-width: 71.25em){.furniture-wrapper #headline h1,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=headline] h1,.furniture-wrapper .headline h1{max-width:540px;font-size:50px}}@media (min-width: 46.25em){.furniture-wrapper .keyline-4,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=lines]{margin-right:0}}@media (min-width: 61.25em){.furniture-wrapper .keyline-4,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=lines]{display:none}}.furniture-wrapper .keyline-4 svg,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=lines] svg{stroke:var(–headerBorder)}@media (min-width: 46.25em){.furniture-wrapper #meta,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=meta]{margin-right:0}}.furniture-wrapper #meta .meta__social,.furniture-wrapper #meta .meta__social ul li a span,.furniture-wrapper #meta .meta__comment,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=meta] .meta__social,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=meta] .meta__social ul li a span,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=meta] .meta__comment{border-color:var(–headerBorder)}.furniture-wrapper #meta .content__meta-container_dcr>div>gu-island,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=meta] .content__meta-container_dcr>div>gu-island{display:none}.furniture-wrapper .standfirst,.furniture-wrapper #standfirst,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=standfirst]{margin-left:-10px;padding-left:10px;position:relative}@media (min-width: 46.25em){.furniture-wrapper .standfirst,.furniture-wrapper #standfirst,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=standfirst]{padding-top:2px}}.furniture-wrapper .standfirst p,.furniture-wrapper #standfirst p,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=standfirst] p{font-weight:400;font-size:20px;padding-bottom:14px}.furniture-wrapper #main-media,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=media]{position:relative;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:2px;grid-area:portrait}.furniture-wrapper #main-media div div,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=media] div div{width:100%;margin-inline:0}@media (min-width: 61.25em){.furniture-wrapper #main-media,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=media]{margin-bottom:0}}@media (max-width: 46.24em){.furniture-wrapper #main-media,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=media]{width:calc(100vw – var(–scrollbar-width, 0px));margin-left:-10px}}@media (max-width: 46.24em) and (min-width: 30em){.furniture-wrapper #main-media,.furniture-wrapper [data-gu-name=media]{margin-left:-20px}}.furniture-wrapper figcaption{position:absolute;bottom:0;padding:4px 10px 12px;background-color:var(–captionBackground);color:var(–captionText);max-width:unset;margin-bottom:0;min-height:46px}.furniture-wrapper figcaption span{color:var(–headerBorder)}.furniture-wrapper figcaption span svg{fill:var(–headerBorder)}.furniture-wrapper figcaption span:nth-of-type(1){display:none}.furniture-wrapper figcaption span:nth-of-type(2){display:inline;max-width:90%}@media (min-width: 30em){.furniture-wrapper figcaption{padding:4px 20px 12px}}.furniture-wrapper figcaption.hidden{opacity:0}.furniture-wrapper #caption-button{display:block;position:absolute;bottom:10px;right:8px;z-index:30;background-color:var(–captionBackground);border:none;border-radius:50%;padding:6px 5px 5px}.furniture-wrapper #caption-button svg{transform:scale(.85)}@media (min-width: 30em){.furniture-wrapper #caption-button{right:10px}}@media (min-width: 71.25em){.content__main-column–interactive:before{top:-12px!important;height:calc(100% + 24px)!important}}.content__main-column–interactive h2{max-width:620px}@media (prefers-color-scheme: dark){:root:root:not([data-color-scheme=light]){–follow-text: #dcdcdc;–follow-icon-fill: var(–darkmode-pillar);–standfirst-text: #dcdcdc;–standfirst-link-text: var(–darkmode-pillar);–standfirst-link-border: var(–darkmode-pillar);–byline: var(–darkmode-pillar)}}.article .article__body h2,article.content–interactiMy mother is in a Ziploc bag on my lap, squeezed between a half-eaten bag of trail mix and my purse. My stomach is queasy from the winding roads up to Yosemite, where I’ve come to scatter her ashes, and I’m having an existential crisis. I had pictured this day as a beautiful farewell that would feel deeply meaningful. Instead, it was all improvised: a plastic bag, a last-minute choice, and ginger chews to keep me from getting carsick. I thought my 20s would be about kissing the wrong people in Los Angeles bars, not reading paperbacks on a hospital cot while my mom had her fifth brain surgery. My friends were away at college, debating sororities and semesters abroad; I was learning a completely different set of skills. At 21, I found out my mom had glioblastoma, a deadly brain cancer. Soon I was in the Bakersfield law library, Googling how to become my 16-year-old brother’s legal guardian, and discovering that the same charm I used to get a table at Nobu could also get my mom a better room at Cedars-Sinai hospital. She ended up in the room where Elizabeth Taylor had died a few months earlier, a detail she loved to tell her friends about.
When you can’t afford to pay, you end up grieving illegally. I don’t remember much from that last month of her life. I mostly just remember the gunk I wiped from her eyes as she settled into her final sleep. The home hospice nurse told my brother and me to give our mother “permission” to let go. Her fragile body was still fighting, and the nurse believed she was holding on for us. So through our snot and tears, we told her to go. But secretly, in every paused breath, I hoped she wouldn’t. She died within eight months of her initial diagnosis. She was 44 years old. When the paramedics arrived, I left the room. A white sheet over her body would make it final in a way I wasn’t ready for yet. Eventually, in the middle of everything else, I had to figure out what to do with her body. Then there was the price tag. A typical funeral with a viewing and burial in the US costs $8,300. Even cremation now costs more than $2,200 – an unthinkable sum for me at the time. I was a senior airman in the US air force, making about $2,200 a month. When you can’t afford to pay, you end up grieving illegally – as I did.
My mom had asked to be cremated. Because my family and I were “sharing” her remains, we needed a way to divide her among multiple people: me, my brother and my aunt. The cheapest option the funeral home offered was a maroon plastic box. I bought one, brought her home, and we portioned her into plastic bags. Later, my aunt took me to a boutique and helped me pick out little wooden boxes for each of us. Small carved wooden things, prettier than what the funeral home had offered – and cheaper. It felt like a repair. It also didn’t quite work. The box had seams, and my mother kept slipping out of the cracks, a thin layer of her showing up on shelves and dressers and inside drawers. When it came time to drive to Yosemite, I put her back in a plastic bag. One thing I didn’t know was that scattering human remains in a national park requires a special use permit. That seems obvious now, but when you’re grieving, reading any fine print is a big undertaking.
The industry of dying wasn’t always so burdensome. Before the civil war, most Americans died at home and were prepared for burial by their own families. Embalming became widespread only after the war, when battlefield deaths created a mass market for preserving bodies long enough to ship them north. What followed was tradition making way for a business model: the funeral home, the professional embalmer, the licensed director, the sealed casket, the manicured lawn cemetery. One factor pushing the industry toward higher prices is consolidation. Over the last two decades, large death-care congLarge conglomerates have taken over independent funeral homes, gaining enough pricing power in some markets to trigger federal antitrust action. What was once a family business is increasingly becoming a subsidiary.
None of this happened by accident, and it is not—as the industry sometimes claims—a response to what families want. Justin Crowe, founder of Parting Stone, a Santa Fe company that turns cremated remains into solid stones, told me that the shift from burial to cremation went from 5% in 1970 to over 63% today.
“When the customer said, actually, we want cremation,” he said, “I think the industry kind of made a mistake at that moment. It didn’t really nurture that change. It didn’t provide the value to the experience of cremation, like it had to the experience of burial.”
What families were asking for, in other words, was a cheaper, less institutional death—one where the body didn’t disappear into a funeral home and come back as an invoice. But what they got was the same process, marked up, only this time with cremated remains.
And a growing number of families, faced with a version of dignity they could not afford, began improvising.
My friend Danielle Directo-Meston, a fellow journalist in Los Angeles, grew up in a family where death doesn’t happen offstage.
“Filipinos, my family in particular, we go to the cemetery to hang out,” she told me. “We just hang out there for most of the morning and afternoon. And then we’ll go get lunch together.”
They go to sit with relatives who have died, to clean the graves, adorn them with flowers, and spend time as a family; it’s a habit with roots in Undas, the Filipino tradition of spending All Saints’ and All Souls’ Day at the family plot.
‘We live in grief-phobic societies’: experts on how to get more comfortable with death
Read more
Unlike many Americans, Danielle was raised to be comfortable around the dead. She has also had a lot of practice. In the last several years, she has lost a cousin in a motorcycle accident, an uncle after a series of strokes, and both of her grandmothers. She was still not prepared for how the American death-care industry actually operates.
The clearest example came at Rose Hills, a large cemetery in Whittier, California. Rose Hills is owned by Service Corporation International, a conglomerate absorbing independent funeral homes across the country. Danielle’s family was there for a gathering, honoring a passed loved one, when a salesperson approached them.
“When you’re at the cemetery having a family gathering,” she said, “they have salespeople try to sell you on more plots.”
She made it clear this wasn’t one bad day, or one bad salesperson. It was the norm. Anyone attending a service there would encounter it.
After watching her family cycle through this multiple times, Danielle made a different choice for herself. She decided to preplan her own funeral with a Washington-based company that offers natural organic reduction, the process of transforming a human body into soil, legal in a growing number of states.
“It’s around $5,000, which is doable,” she said. “I can pay that when I’m alive, and no one has to worry about it. Compared to $20,000 just for the plot alone at the cemetery, and that’s on top of the mortuary and all of that stuff.”
Danielle will be composted. I scattered my mother by hand in a national park without a permit. Neither of us did what the industry wanted us to do.
Somewhere between the seventh and the eighth bend, I pulled over and slid down an escarpment to an opening with shrubbery and trees. There wasn’t anything particularly special about the space, except for how the light passed through the leaves.
The year before she died, my mother told me she was taking me and my brother to Hawaii. It would have been our first family trip; the furthest we had ever vacationed was Kern River, 90 minutes from home. She had spent years trying to piece together where she came from. Her father was Hawaiian and had left when she was a baby. Her mother had never known her own father either. So myMy mother spent her life learning who she was, the way you learn a language—alone and slowly. She had already booked the flights for October. But by fall, she was too sick to travel. She died on 26 December, exactly one year after she told me about the trip. I looked down at the bag in my hands. I wished I had planned to scatter her at night under a full moon, where I could dance naked in front of a fire and chant her blessings. Or that I had carried her to the Redwoods, finding a spot at dawn when the rocks are covered in moss and dew and the air is crisp. Or even better, smuggled her to Hawaii and released her over the Pacific at sunset—her favorite time of day. Instead, I settled on a sunny spot by a newborn tree. It was about three feet high and eager to grow taller. It would welcome her remains with enthusiasm, and its new life would overcome her old one—a fitting symbol of the cycle of life. I opened the bag and shook it around, flinging her into the breeze, watching the particles of a woman who loved me travel toward Half Dome. I walked back to my car and stretched my arm out the window on the drive down, surfing the wind with my hand. Pieces of my mother flew out from under my fingernails. It is the most loving thing I have ever done for her.
This article was amended on 16 October 2026 to correct that Elizabeth Taylor died months before the author’s mother did, not weeks, as previously stated.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here is a list of FAQs about the topic The last thing I did for my mother was illegal
General Beginner Questions
1 What does The last thing I did for my mother was illegal mean
It is a phrase often used in stories movies or real life where a person commits a crime to help their parent It usually involves breaking the law to provide care mercy or financial help when no legal options seem available
2 Is this a specific book or movie
It is not one specific famous title It is a theme or a hook used in dramas crime stories and personal essays It describes a moral dilemma where love for a parent conflicts with the law
3 What kind of illegal acts are usually involved
Common examples include
Mercy killing Helping a suffering parent die
Stealing medicine Taking expensive drugs a parent cannot afford
Fraud Signing a parents name on checks to pay their bills
Smuggling Bringing in unapproved treatments from another country
4 Why would someone do something illegal for their mother
Usually because of desperation and love The person feels the legal system has failed them or they cannot afford proper care They believe breaking the law is the only way to stop their mothers pain or save her life
5 Is this always about death
No It can also be about keeping a mother out of a nursing home paying for housing or protecting her from an abuser when the police cannot help
Intermediate Practical Questions
6 What is the difference between mercy killing and murder
Legally murder is intentionally killing someone unlawfully Mercy killing is killing someone out of compassion to end their suffering In most places mercy killing is still legally considered murder even though the motive is different
7 If my mother asks me to help her die is it legal
In most countries and US states no Only a few places allow assisted dying under strict rules Even there you must follow specific legal steps Doing it yourself without following those rules is a crime
