Benediction: Lives Reviewed

Released Feb 2013 by Knopf

Kent Haruf presents a novel spoken sotto voce and focused on the last days of a 77-year-old hardware store owner, Dad Lewis and his family living in east of Denver in the fictional town of Holt, Colorado.

Lewis learns in the opening chapter that he has cancer that will claim him in a matter of weeks.  During this time, Lewis reviews his life--his business relationships, his parenting choices, and his marriage.

While the title implies a sustained focus on achieving closure for a dying man, other characters from the same small town of Haruf's storyworld are taking stock of their lives as well.

The preacher and his family, newly arrived from Denver, must ask themselves if their lives have meaning, and if they should make a change. A mature woman long widowed and her never-married daughter make decisions on what "love your neighbor" really means One considers the meaning of romantic love in relationships now lost. An 8-year-old girl seeks to claim a sense of family in the wake of her mother's death from breast cancer.

Most of the novel brings the reader's attention to the dulled beauty and muffled joy of every day activities. This isn't a fast-paced novel filled with back-to-back conflicts. It's a Sunday drive through the countryside of people's ordinary lives.

Widowed Support Groups

Photo by megaroo.

The loss of a spouse is one of the most devastating events of a person's life. In fact, the Holmes-Rahe Stress Inventory lists "death of spouse" as the most stress-inducing life event.

While scholars attempt to study grief objectively, the reality is that each loss of a spouse is unique to the individual.

Even though I like to draw on evidenced-based research when confronted with conflict, I recognize that the bereaved don't need scholarly journals as much as they need a compassionate friend or comforting community.

Sharing Photos

Photo by Fulvio. 

Disclosure: I am participating in the Verizon Boomer Voices program and have been provided with a device and six months of service in exchange for my honest opinions about the product. 

For the past three years, I've been visiting friends who live in skilled nursing centers.  I enjoy listening to them talk about people, places and events from their youth.  I have learned some things about the Dust Bowl, World War II, and life in small towns located in central California, south central Kansas and eastern Pennsylvania.

In order to aid the conversation, sometimes I bring in books and magazines to help jog a friend's memory. After spending some time and money on coffee table books, I finally recognized an inexhaustable and handy resource in my purse.

My smart phone.

The Ultimate Performance Art: Love

Central Recover Press 2013.

I've noticed that there are a lot of books about caregiving. I've had the opportunity to read several.  Surprisingly, I haven't reached the point of saturation.

Why am I still engaged?

While earning my master's in gerontology, I read many interesting statistics and many solid evidenced-based scholarly articles on family caregivers in general and caring for people with dementia specifically.

However, the work of scientists and social scientists cannot fully capture the caregiving experience.

The relationship between caregiver and the person with a chronic or a terminal disease is more complex than any scholar can communicate.  

I strongly believe that artists are better equipped to represent the caregiving experience.  

I invite you to read Deborah Shouse's book Love in the Land of Dementia: Finding Hope in the Caregiver's Journey.  (See my review on Goodreads.) Shouse brings her skill as an accomplished writer to the task.  But more than that, Shouse brings her character; she's attentive, kind, perceptive and wise.