On Publishing My Memoir of Grief As My Father Lays Dying

“My job as a parent isn’t over until your book gets published,” my father said, years ago. I don’t remember the circumstances of this statement—where we were, what we were doing. I want to say it had something to do with his body, maybe the deterioration of his lungs to COPD, his breathing so labored he’d reverse his car out of the garage, open the car door, and use a grabber to get the newspaper, because walking that short distance to the driveway was too difficult, even with a steady flow of oxygen through a hose. I want to say there was a connection between the body and the need to see your child achieve the thing she set out to do, but I don’t think this is true. It’s more likely his declaration originated from something less grave, at least on its surface. Like the time he gifted me with new shoe brushes and saddle soap and boot polish and I, after having borrowed his brushes for years because we both take care of our leather shoes, said something like, “But this means I won’t need you anymore.” “Not true,” he might have said. “Besides, my job as a parent isn’t over.” * I was quarantined with COVID at my home in Pennsylvania when I Facetimed my father in September 2022, a grin spreading on my face. “Well why are you smiling?” he asked. I had just gotten off the phone with my agent, who had told me, after over 15 years of writing and trying to find a home for my memoir, that a publisher wanted to offer me a book deal. The sudden death of my mother feels nothing like the slow deterioration of my father’s body. “Your job is finished,” I said to my father, holding back tears of joy. “I did it.” * It’s now a year later and I think, I should never have said this. Because it seems his body heard me and then relented. * I’ve flown to Oklahoma because he’s entered the hospital for blood in his urine. I haven’t […]

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