White Hot Grief Parade

PART ONE

DEATH

Things I’d Tell My Seventeen-Year-Old Self

Whenever I meet people, they inevitably get curious about the idiosyncratic arc of my life. Common questions include: "Where did you go to college?" or "How did you end up in the UK?" The answers, of course, are complicated, because in the autumn of 2001, I lost my father to a lifelong battle with cancer. I was just eighteen, only a few months out of high school, and a few weeks into my freshman year of college.

What followed was a very strange and challenging chapter of my life that I rarely take out and examine, for obvious reasons.

Thus, I do what we all do: I CliffsNotes it—that is, I give you the gist. I skip over this bizarre chapter of Twilight Zone weirdness that for many years I felt no one else could possibly understand (unless they were, by some coincidence, there). So whenever I tell the CliffsNotes story of my life it goes like this:

My dad died.

I moved to Scotland.

I grew up.

And here we are at this cocktail party.

But of course, everyone’s story is more nuanced than that. For all of us there exists that space between the lines of our first two CliffsNotes sentences—the space where a universe of life occurred. Where I faced, experienced, and walked within the universal fear all humanity—regardless of time period, culture or status—spends its waking hours fending off: the loss of someone they love. Where, like so many others who overcome adversity, I learned to stand back up. At the intersection of childhood and adulthood.

At eighteen, I suppose no one would have blamed me for capitulating to grief under such circumstances. It was a mighty blow at such a crucial moment in anyone’s development. Despite being bright, hardworking, and full of ambitions, I was also sensitive and did not have the appropriate skills to cope with such a loss.

Yet, in reflection I recognize that the secret of my personal resilience lay within that enigmatic fold between those CliffsNotes lines, lessons gifted to me by the people who shared the chapter—in every way the heroes of this story and of my actual life—who lifted, taught, and revealed to me what I am—what we all are—truly made of. It was in the in-between chapter that I experienced the thing every human being fears the most, and I lived. And, having lived, I learned; What else was there to be afraid of? The loss provided the ultimate gift: fearlessness.

Some people tell me I was brave. But I didn’t feel brave. I felt terrified. It was in this secret chapter that I learned one can’t be courageous unless one feels afraid. I felt compelled to write the invisible chapter down and own every messy, awkward, ugly, hilarious, roaring, agonizing moment. To document standing back up.

I know now that such a document doesn’t begin with the death. It begins right now—looking back upon those charmed and sacred days, the moments before it all came crashing down.

Before we lost Dad, before the dying and the feuding and the grieving, there was just me: Al, a seventeen-year-old with her own set of concerns and everything ahead of her.

Here’s what I’d tell my seventeen-year-old self:

1. It is all ahead of you.

2. You are not fat.

3. That thing you are all working so hard to prevent? It is going to happen. Soon. Enjoy this last year. Go on a lot of walks with your dad, ask for more stories, remember his eyes, his smell, the squeeze of his hand. What seems like always and forever will be gone.

4. Frizz Ease. Buy it.

5. You’re going to get many, many letters, phone calls, and all forms of messages from people about how much you and your entire family mean to them.

6. Some people are going to call you Alex rather than Al. Try to forgive; they know not what they do.

7. Wear sunscreen. All. The. Time.

8. Wear any outfit you want. Because you can.

9. You are not going to believe this, but you do not know everything. Also, your parents are right. About a lot of things.

10. There is life after not doing it all perfectly.

11. Keep writing.

12. When your mom offers to teach you how to cook, sew, tile the basement, use power tools, install a ceiling fan, or reverse flush an engine core, do not blow her off.

13. He will be unbelievable. He will exceed every possible expectation of what a young man of seventeen should be able to handle. More people should be like him. But, Al? You have six months. Just that. Six months before your tender romance that is currently full of every pleasure of magical, hopeful youth will turn very, very dark and serious. But he will stay, for years. And he will hold you and stand by you and you will grow up together. Never stop feeling grateful. Never stop thanking him. Never forget how you loved him or, indeed, how he loved you. And although he is not the One, no one else could have been better right at this moment.

14. Fortune favors the brave. And you are braver than you think.

15. The friends you have right now? They are incredible. In a few months, they will all absolutely blow your mind with loyalty and resilience no seventeen- or eighteen-year-olds should rightly possess.

16. And seriously: buy Frizz Ease.

Pain Pills: A Prologue

It was our first family vacation in years, and it would be our last.

My grandparents Albert and Edna owned a condo in Sarasota, Florida, where, just like the nearly two-thirds of Jewish Detroit, they spent their winters with all the other Midwestern snowbirds. The condo was modest but glorious—a small two bedroom that smelled of sea salt, right on the Gulf of Mexico with the whitest sand you have ever seen, infinite shells, shuffle board, tennis, and even a swimming pool in the back. Despite scant company for children, Sarasota was warm and breezy and, when Albert and Edna weren’t there, it was paradise. We spent a few of our family vacations there in my childhood, but we hadn’t returned in years.

We each had our roles when it came to the seaside. My mother was the sun worshipper. Nothing pleased her more than slathering herself in oil and baking in the sun like a true California girl of the 1960s. (Please do not ask me how her skin has never given her a stitch of trouble, nor how she manages to still look thirty years old. It is possible that she drinks the blood of virgins. I am praying I get my fully deserved 50 percent of those genes because the Silber half of the family look like raisins). I was the shade dweller. I had loved the water as a child; you couldn’t keep me from diving in with abandon. But, as I grew, so did my water-related anxieties, so I stayed safely on shore, most often in the shade beneath a Joshua tree. My father split the difference. He enjoyed dabbling: a little shore, a little swim, a little stroll, a little Frisbee with anyone he could convince to play with him. But his favorite activity was staring endlessly at the water, contemplating anything and everything. He sometimes did this from his beach chair and sometimes from the terrace of Albert and Edna’s condo that overlooked the waves.

The terrace was where I found him that night.

In the haunted early hours of the morning—where it is no longer night but not yet day—I was startled from sleep, suddenly wide awake and anxious. I rose and went out onto the terrace to let the ocean waves calm me until I could sleep again. And there he was.

Hi Papa, I said, suddenly aware that this moment was sacred. Running into one another in the middle of the night doesn’t happen much when you go to boarding school.

He looked up at me and moved a chair closer so that I might sit beside him. I could see a bottle of prescription pills in his hand.

What’s wrong, Dad? I asked.

My back feels awful.

For how long?

I don’t know, maybe about a month or so?

I’d never seen him like this. Calm, but not calm.

I’m . . . he said, hesitating. I’m scared to take the pills.

OK, I said. Can you tell me why?

Because—because pain is supposed to help indicate what is wrong with your body, and if I kill the pain, then I can’t figure out what is going on.

He was a problem solver. No big deal: you dive in, you figure out the problem, and then problem solved. But cancer didn’t work that way. He’d go in, get the treatments, and then four weeks, four months, four years later, he would still have cancer—and often more cancer, in different places. Cancer would send out its envoys, and cancer colonies would take root. Sometimes cancer would pack up and move out. Sometimes not. This was the first time I had ever seen my father stumped or obviously troubled, and I was so honored that he wasn’t hiding it from me. Here in the middle of the night, he was sharing his fear. A full disclosure.

Well, I said. What do we know?

He smiled broadly. What do we know? was a Mike Silber catch phrase, his signature tactic to set all the cards out on the table and look at them.

I continued. OK, we know a few certainties, I said. First, you are uncomfortable. Discomfort is bad. Second, you want to know what is wrong. That is natural. Assessment: Unless we go to the hospital right now—which we can absolutely do, by the way—I don’t think you are going to figure out all of the answers tonight. I am also pretty certain that nothing good comes from a lack of sleep, and you can’t sleep if you are in pain. So, all that said, I think you should take the pill now and, in the morning, you will at least be rested enough to make a good decision about the next step.

He looked at me and smiled.

Yes, he said. You’re right. His expression was a combination of pride and gratitude.

I got up to fetch him a glass of water, beaming. I am capable, I thought. I can make a difference here. I just need to be given an opportunity to help.

Returning with the water, I asked, What would Bob say?

‘I feel good, I feel great, I feel wonderful,’ he said, quoting from our mutual favorite movie, the Bill Murray classic What About Bob?

‘I feel good, I feel great, I feel wonderful,’ we said in unison, imitating Bob’s opening lines. We laughed and looked at one another.

Thanks, Al, he said.

It is the only time I ever remember truly contributing to the fight.

The Dying

I brought with me exactly nothing. I had barely gathered my thoughts the day I stopped in the streets of Minneapolis, dropped my books and, zombielike, got into a taxi to the airport. So when I awoke from the fog, there was nothing to unpack—nothing but the hard realities of every day ahead.

And so I am sleeping in the spare bedroom downstairs tonight, in a pair of light- and dark-blue-checkered pajamas that had been left at the bottom of a reject drawer in my childhood bedroom. Reject pajamas, plus a teal, moth-eaten wool sweater acquired from the dorm share box last spring. Yep. My night-before-the-death outfit is definitely nailing it.

Next to me in bed is Jensen Kent, the Love of My Youth. Kent is asleep next to me, the very fact of which is off, because if Dad were not upstairs dying, he would almost certainly prevent his teenage daughter from lying in bed next to her teenage boyfriend.

But there is nothing funny going on. Kent is asleep, and I am wide-awake and thinking about what must be going on upstairs.

The dying.

I’m also thinking about Bob.

What About Bob? is my undisputed favorite film of all time. In a top-ten list of favorite films, Bob would take up the top three slots. I could watch it on repeat. I could probably quote the entire thing from beginning to end (with intonations and pauses, inflections, music cues, and everything) if you challenged me to. In fact I dare you: challenge me to. Go on.¹

First things first:

What About Bob? is a 1991 film directed by Frank Oz about a doctorpatient relationship that goes way beyond the office. Bob Wiley (played brilliantly by Bill Murray) is a neurotic psychiatric patient struggling with a whirlwind of paralyzing phobias who, with all the subtlety of crazy-glue, attaches himself to Dr. Leo Marvin (played by the equally astonishing Richard Dreyfuss). He goes to see Dr. Marvin and, in one session, Bob becomes a zealous devotee of Dr. Marvin’s latest psychiatric method, detailed in his best-selling book Baby Steps. Bob bonds with and comes to depend upon Dr. Marvin so much that—in the most charming way conceivable—Bob follows his doctor on his month-long vacation in New Hampshire.

Dr. Marvin wants a few weeks of rest and relaxation because he is preparing for a big interview on Good Morning America—a needy patient who can’t take a hint is the last thing he needs! Thus Dr. Marvin demands that Bob return home to New York. But Bob decides to stay to indulge in his very own vacation from his problems, and remains in the area. While Dr. Marvin is driven increasingly insane, Marvin’s neighbors, wife, daughter, and death-obsessed son Sigmund all take to Bob’s openness, loopy charm, self-effacing humor, and sense of fun—none of which Dr. Marvin himself possesses.

Let’s first get a few things clear:

I did not play it so many times on VHS that it began to skip.

I have never claimed that Bob is the I Ching. Not ever.

I have not quoted Bob to total strangers on public transportation.

I do not love it so much that sometimes I put it on just as wallpaper while I clean the house or do my taxes.

I did not get so frustrated by my inability to access Bob’s amusement and wisdom at all times that I resorted to holding a professional (purpose-bought) microphone up to the television speaker to record the entire film on a 120- minute audio cassette so that I might listen to it on my Walkman . . . or in the car . . . or at summer camp . . .

Any of those things might mean that I was an obsessive, crazy fool. So . . . yes . . . OK. The truth is that I am a fool for What About Bob? and I don’t care who knows it.

When listing favorite films, I have always considered it important to designate and divide into separate categories: The Favorite Films That Are Legitimate Works of Art and Really Challenge You List— Citizen Kane and Schindler’s List-y films that are inarguably brilliant but require focus and discipline and serious-mindedness. And the Special Favorite Films You Could Watch Again and Again Because They Make You Feel Amazing List—which includes things like The Great Muppet Caper and The Jerk. Sometimes there is a crossover (Amelie). But the point is that I think everybody has a film or two like Bob: the kind of favorite movie you love so much that the second it ends, you could press rewind and watch the whole damn thing again.

I know people who irrationally love Big. I know people who can quote the entirety of National Lampoon’s European Adventure. I know a handful of people who can’t get enough of Turner and Hooch.² Well, for our family, it was What About Bob? and it all started with Dad. I was nine years old the first time we ever watched it in the last home we ever had in Los Angeles, on Bedford Drive in Beverly Hills. He practically sprinted out to purchase the VHS the day it came out, and we watched it twice, back to back.

Dad loved this movie for reasons I may never fully know and desperately wish I did. Perhaps it had something to do with the odd take on psychiatry. Perhaps it had to do with Bob’s innocence, or Bill Murray’s irreverent but childlike sense of humor that reminded me so much of Dad’s. Perhaps it was because the film has a really touching central message, but doesn’t take itself too seriously. Perhaps it was just amusing; I truly don’t know, but the film became important to me because it was important to him. We would watch it together, laugh, quote, laugh some more, and as I grew, Bob took on its very own significance.

When I woke up in the morning Dad would often greet me with: "Good morning, Gil . . . I said good morning, Gil."

Or the casual greeting of Ahoy!

If someone asked how he felt about something, he might respond with: There are two types of people in this world: those who like Neil Diamond and those who don’t.

When someone was mean to me at school, he would quote Bob’s wisdom: You know, I treat people as if they were telephones. If I meet somebody I think doesn’t like me I say to myself, I say, ‘Bob, this one is temporarily out of order.’ You know, don’t break the connection, just hang up and try again!

Therein lies the allure of What About Bob? Bob Wiley, it would seem, is oddly enlightened, and What About Bob? is oddly profound. With each re-viewing of this 90s comedy, I discovered another level of meaning, a deeper sense of universal profundity. This comic insanity mixed with penetrating insight is a quality only such genius clowns like Bill Murray seem to be capable of portraying: those rare comedians so in touch with life’s harsh truths, that they make it their mission to (brilliantly) cultivate laughter. And every time I watch Bob, I not only felt smarter or wiser, but I felt closer to my dad.

About two-thirds of the way into the film, we find Bob sleeping over at the Marvins’ Lake Winnipesaukee home due to a torrential rainstorm. He shares a room with Siggy, Dr. Marvin’s eleven-year-old son. They lie there in their PJs, in angled twin beds, staring into the darkness. Siggy looks terrified:

SIGGY: Bob?

BOB: Yeah?

SIGGY: Are you afraid of death?

Bob is caught off guard. He is suddenly frightened, too—his eyes grow wide and searching, like a child trying to keep his cool.

BOB: Yeah.

(It’s a yeah as in a Yeah, so?—a way particular to children one-upping each other.)

SIGGY: Me, too. And there’s no way out of it. You’re going to die. I’m going to die. It’s going to happen.

(Siggy blinks; clearly the fear is very, very real.)

SIGGY: And who cares if it’s tomorrow or eighty years? Much sooner in your case. Do you know how fast time goes? I was six, like, yesterday.

BOB: Me, too.

SIGGY: I’m going to die. You are going to die. What else is there to be afraid of?

And so I think. I think about The Dying.

In that moment, as I lie downstairs in ratty checkered pajamas beside Kent, that very scene from that very stupid, over-quoted, over-played, trivial and pathetically beloved movie is all I can think of.

My dad is going to die.

There is no way out of it.

And who cares if it really is tomorrow or in eighty years?

It is going to happen.

And if he dies, I am very certain that I might die, too.

Siggy is right; What else