Amy Monticello, the author of this week’s Sunday Rumpus essay, wrote about her father’s illness and death in real time (here’s a representative essay of hers from The Nervous Breakdown) and I read the pieces while holding my breath. Lucky enough in middle age to have my own elderly parents and my in-laws still here and healthy, I’m just starting to grapple with the fact that they’ll die—and maybe soon.
Here’s my father Paul Zolbrod writing in Literary Orphans about the reach of his long-term memory. He talks about how his study of literature, including the Navajo oral tradition, informed his view of life.
Here’s former Sunday Rumpus editor Gina Frangello writing about caring for her elderly parents during medical emergencies and contemplating what it means to love both as a parent and as an adult child.
And speaking of good writing and the fact of eventual death and Gina, I think there are still spots open in the Other Voice Queretaro summer writing program she runs with Stacy Bierlein. It takes place in May, and this year the faculty will include Emily Rapp, whose stunning writing on loss and grief Amy mentions in her essay. If this sounds great to you, maybe you should seize the day and sign up.
