By the time I married my husband, my mother-in-law was battling early Alzheimer’s. She was warm and bubbly, but I always regretted not knowing her at her prime. She had been a sharp, organized woman who gave up a teaching career to raise her four boys. I’m told she ran a tight household, made delicious meals, budgeted wisely and kept her kids in check. Even as her memory began to slip, she cooked up a storm whenever we visited Honolulu, where my husband grew up. Occasionally, she began to slip up as her memory gave way, like the time she substituted lemon juice for chicken broth in a pot of saimin.