Death & Grief
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Sanctuary: A Memoir
"[An] often beautiful jewel of a book . . . Black's power as a writer means she can take us with her to places that normally our minds would refuse to go."-The New York Times Book Review (Editors' Choice)
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Still Point of the Turning World comes an incisive memoir about how she came to question and redefine the concept of resilience after the trauma of her first child's death.
"Congratulations on the resurrection of your life," a colleague wrote to Emily Rapp Black when she announced the birth of her second child. The line made Rapp Black pause. Her first child, a boy named Ronan, had died from Tay-Sachs disease before he turned three years old, an experience she wrote about in her second book, The Still Point of the Turning World. Since that time, her life had changed utterly: She left the marriage that fractured under the terrible weight of her son's illness, got remarried to a man who she fell in love with while her son was dying, had a flourishing career, and gave birth to a healthy baby girl. But she rejected the idea that she was leaving her old life behind-that she had, in the manner of the mythical phoenix, risen from the ashes and been reborn into a new story, when she still carried so much of her old story with her. More to the point, she wanted to carry it with her. Everyone she met told her she was resilient, strong, courageous in ways they didn't think they could be. But what did those words mean, really?
This book is an attempt to unpack the various notions of resilience that we carry as a culture. Drawing on contemporary psychology, neurology, etymology, literature, art, and self-help, Emily Rapp Black shows how we need a more complex understanding of this concept when applied to stories of loss and healing and overcoming the odds, knowing that we may be asked to rebuild and reimagine our lives at any moment, and often when we least expect it. Interwoven with lyrical, unforgettable personal vignettes from her life as a mother, wife, daughter, friend, and teacher, Rapp Black creates a stunning tapestry that is full of wisdom and insight.
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Still Point of the Turning World comes an incisive memoir about how she came to question and redefine the concept of resilience after the trauma of her first child's death.
"Congratulations on the resurrection of your life," a colleague wrote to Emily Rapp Black when she announced the birth of her second child. The line made Rapp Black pause. Her first child, a boy named Ronan, had died from Tay-Sachs disease before he turned three years old, an experience she wrote about in her second book, The Still Point of the Turning World. Since that time, her life had changed utterly: She left the marriage that fractured under the terrible weight of her son's illness, got remarried to a man who she fell in love with while her son was dying, had a flourishing career, and gave birth to a healthy baby girl. But she rejected the idea that she was leaving her old life behind-that she had, in the manner of the mythical phoenix, risen from the ashes and been reborn into a new story, when she still carried so much of her old story with her. More to the point, she wanted to carry it with her. Everyone she met told her she was resilient, strong, courageous in ways they didn't think they could be. But what did those words mean, really?
This book is an attempt to unpack the various notions of resilience that we carry as a culture. Drawing on contemporary psychology, neurology, etymology, literature, art, and self-help, Emily Rapp Black shows how we need a more complex understanding of this concept when applied to stories of loss and healing and overcoming the odds, knowing that we may be asked to rebuild and reimagine our lives at any moment, and often when we least expect it. Interwoven with lyrical, unforgettable personal vignettes from her life as a mother, wife, daughter, friend, and teacher, Rapp Black creates a stunning tapestry that is full of wisdom and insight.
Editorial Reviews
Chapter One
This Particular Fire
When a human is asked about a particular fire,
she comes close:
then it is too hot,
so she turns her face-
and that's when the forest of her bearable life appears,
always on the other side of the fire.
Katie Ford, "The Fire"
My three-year-old daughter, Charlie, screams for twenty uninterrupted minutes after I break her graham cracker at snack time. She asks instead for white rice, and it must be "ice cold," but the ice cubes used to chill it (a process she supervises) can no longer be present or even in view at the time of delivery in the bowl, which must be pink, and which she must select herself from the drawer where I keep her collection of plastic dishes. "I do it!" she insists, a statement she repeats countless times a day, often stomping a tiny foot and crossing her arms, like a parody of toddler behavior, only she is quite serious. I remind myself she can do it; let her do it. This, the teachers at her Montessori school have assured me, is the best way to foster independence, that essential building block of human development. "Development": a word that once made me hollow with sadness.
My experience caring for Ronan was so different, so quiet, all of the activity internal: the pain of watching him worsen and fade; the constant, wrenching speculation (Was he hurting? Was he worsening? Were we closer to the end, and what came after? Was that a seizure or just a hiccup or a giggle?), that I'm learning for the first time how to be a mother to a child who is independent and will continue to be so; a child who I hope will live a long life and attend my funeral and scatter my ashes in a place of her choosing, as is the right order of things, or at least the order we think we sign up for when or if we start families.
Ronan was my silent, sweet companion. Charlie talks back, has opinions, ideas, moods, and so many strongly felt emotions that she can express and sometimes name. "I feel lost," she tells me almost wistfully when she's confused, and sometimes, "I'm sad," when she gets pushed at school and she "pushed back so strong" but then clearly feels bad about her actions; or, in New York City, in a hotel room all to ourselves visiting friends, "This is so fun and I'm so happy!" In moments like these, the shift from one parenting experience to another is jarring; the adjustment knocks me off kilter, like a top spinning wildly on a table and falling to the floor, spinning still.
Charlie and I eat the rice and sing "Gorilla in the Sky" (original lyrics and three-line score by me) and then we're off to the grocery store, where I buy Charlie a twenty-dollar enormous princess castle Mylar balloon in exchange for the promise that she will please stay buckled in the c...
This Particular Fire
When a human is asked about a particular fire,
she comes close:
then it is too hot,
so she turns her face-
and that's when the forest of her bearable life appears,
always on the other side of the fire.
Katie Ford, "The Fire"
My three-year-old daughter, Charlie, screams for twenty uninterrupted minutes after I break her graham cracker at snack time. She asks instead for white rice, and it must be "ice cold," but the ice cubes used to chill it (a process she supervises) can no longer be present or even in view at the time of delivery in the bowl, which must be pink, and which she must select herself from the drawer where I keep her collection of plastic dishes. "I do it!" she insists, a statement she repeats countless times a day, often stomping a tiny foot and crossing her arms, like a parody of toddler behavior, only she is quite serious. I remind myself she can do it; let her do it. This, the teachers at her Montessori school have assured me, is the best way to foster independence, that essential building block of human development. "Development": a word that once made me hollow with sadness.
My experience caring for Ronan was so different, so quiet, all of the activity internal: the pain of watching him worsen and fade; the constant, wrenching speculation (Was he hurting? Was he worsening? Were we closer to the end, and what came after? Was that a seizure or just a hiccup or a giggle?), that I'm learning for the first time how to be a mother to a child who is independent and will continue to be so; a child who I hope will live a long life and attend my funeral and scatter my ashes in a place of her choosing, as is the right order of things, or at least the order we think we sign up for when or if we start families.
Ronan was my silent, sweet companion. Charlie talks back, has opinions, ideas, moods, and so many strongly felt emotions that she can express and sometimes name. "I feel lost," she tells me almost wistfully when she's confused, and sometimes, "I'm sad," when she gets pushed at school and she "pushed back so strong" but then clearly feels bad about her actions; or, in New York City, in a hotel room all to ourselves visiting friends, "This is so fun and I'm so happy!" In moments like these, the shift from one parenting experience to another is jarring; the adjustment knocks me off kilter, like a top spinning wildly on a table and falling to the floor, spinning still.
Charlie and I eat the rice and sing "Gorilla in the Sky" (original lyrics and three-line score by me) and then we're off to the grocery store, where I buy Charlie a twenty-dollar enormous princess castle Mylar balloon in exchange for the promise that she will please stay buckled in the c...
Readers Top Reviews
OpsimathAnastasia S.
The subject matter is compelling: Black writes of how she comes to terms with living a life characterized by loss and grief on one hand, and new love and joy on the other. How to honor them both, how to define herself as a mother who has lost a child and a mother who has gained a child, is the core of the book. The writing is lyrical, shimmering. The structure is, like Black's process of learning to live with both sets of emotions and identities, non-linear; this works very well. In the process of her search for new ways to define resilience that will accomplish what she wants to accomplish emotionally, Black investigates a series of ... images? metaphors? She describes the process by which wounds in trees are sealed off, remaining as evidence of the wound while new growth continues; she spends some time analyzing butterflies; and a number of other topics. While I found all of them intriguing and they are a compelling way to talk about the search for models of a different kind of living with grief, with the interlocking of past and present, I also found them distancing. The shift from sometimes very brutal intimate information and gut punches -- spoiler alert -- such as the fact that her ex-husband refuses to tell her what happened to the ashes of her dead son -- to a detached intellectual tone was jarring at points. Again, I think her aim was to unify these two opposite kinds of narrative, the nakedly intimate and the more removed analysis, as she worked to interweave the memory of her son with the ongoing life of her daughter, her own markings of loss and love. But I didn't think it was quite as successful as the other mergings she writes about so beautifully.
Short Excerpt Teaser
Chapter One
This Particular Fire
When a human is asked about a particular fire,
she comes close:
then it is too hot,
so she turns her face-
and that's when the forest of her bearable life appears,
always on the other side of the fire.
Katie Ford, "The Fire"
My three-year-old daughter, Charlie, screams for twenty uninterrupted minutes after I break her graham cracker at snack time. She asks instead for white rice, and it must be "ice cold," but the ice cubes used to chill it (a process she supervises) can no longer be present or even in view at the time of delivery in the bowl, which must be pink, and which she must select herself from the drawer where I keep her collection of plastic dishes. "I do it!" she insists, a statement she repeats countless times a day, often stomping a tiny foot and crossing her arms, like a parody of toddler behavior, only she is quite serious. I remind myself she can do it; let her do it. This, the teachers at her Montessori school have assured me, is the best way to foster independence, that essential building block of human development. "Development": a word that once made me hollow with sadness.
My experience caring for Ronan was so different, so quiet, all of the activity internal: the pain of watching him worsen and fade; the constant, wrenching speculation (Was he hurting? Was he worsening? Were we closer to the end, and what came after? Was that a seizure or just a hiccup or a giggle?), that I'm learning for the first time how to be a mother to a child who is independent and will continue to be so; a child who I hope will live a long life and attend my funeral and scatter my ashes in a place of her choosing, as is the right order of things, or at least the order we think we sign up for when or if we start families.
Ronan was my silent, sweet companion. Charlie talks back, has opinions, ideas, moods, and so many strongly felt emotions that she can express and sometimes name. "I feel lost," she tells me almost wistfully when she's confused, and sometimes, "I'm sad," when she gets pushed at school and she "pushed back so strong" but then clearly feels bad about her actions; or, in New York City, in a hotel room all to ourselves visiting friends, "This is so fun and I'm so happy!" In moments like these, the shift from one parenting experience to another is jarring; the adjustment knocks me off kilter, like a top spinning wildly on a table and falling to the floor, spinning still.
Charlie and I eat the rice and sing "Gorilla in the Sky" (original lyrics and three-line score by me) and then we're off to the grocery store, where I buy Charlie a twenty-dollar enormous princess castle Mylar balloon in exchange for the promise that she will please stay buckled in the cart for thirty minutes while I race through the aisles getting only half of what's on the list, in addition to much that's not on it: a massive cupcake topped with a fist of whipped cream and bright pink candy sprinkles; a box as big as a brick of Goldfish crackers; and bubble bath that makes popping noises as it dissolves in the water, creating a shade of blue that looks like toxic sludge. "I won't drink it!" she promises.
As soon as we arrive home and are headed up the back stairs, stopping to look at lizards, checking out the many birdhouses left in the yard by the previous owners, calling out for Meatball, the stray cat Charlie has named and who we sometimes see skulking through the yard, searching for the tuna and sardines we leave for him on a pink plastic plate, Charlie gets distracted and releases her balloon. "No, wait!" I shout, as if the balloon will mind me. I drop the grocery bags in an effort to save the shiny pink castle from floating up to the top of the tallest palm tree in our wild Southern California yard, where it rocks in the slight breeze, taunting Charlie, the four princesses-Ariel, Rapunzel, Jasmine, Cinderella-slowly rotating past her vision.
"Princesses, no!" Charlie cries, as if they have failed to invite her to the party in the tree. She turns to me. "Why Why Why can't you get it? You're tall! Why?" She stands on her tiptoes and reaches upward with her sticky, sweaty hands, sobbing. After fifteen minutes that feel like a hundred, I am able to coax her, sweating and sniffling and practically hyperventilating, off the porch, where the temperature hovers around 107 degrees. I collect the scattered groceries and pile them on the table, toss the raft of broken eggs in the trash, put the battered milk carton in the refrigerator, and return to a despondent little girl, sitting on the couch with her hands in her lap, silent and sad, floating in an existential, tear-swamped toddler daze. I try every distraction and consolation-so...
This Particular Fire
When a human is asked about a particular fire,
she comes close:
then it is too hot,
so she turns her face-
and that's when the forest of her bearable life appears,
always on the other side of the fire.
Katie Ford, "The Fire"
My three-year-old daughter, Charlie, screams for twenty uninterrupted minutes after I break her graham cracker at snack time. She asks instead for white rice, and it must be "ice cold," but the ice cubes used to chill it (a process she supervises) can no longer be present or even in view at the time of delivery in the bowl, which must be pink, and which she must select herself from the drawer where I keep her collection of plastic dishes. "I do it!" she insists, a statement she repeats countless times a day, often stomping a tiny foot and crossing her arms, like a parody of toddler behavior, only she is quite serious. I remind myself she can do it; let her do it. This, the teachers at her Montessori school have assured me, is the best way to foster independence, that essential building block of human development. "Development": a word that once made me hollow with sadness.
My experience caring for Ronan was so different, so quiet, all of the activity internal: the pain of watching him worsen and fade; the constant, wrenching speculation (Was he hurting? Was he worsening? Were we closer to the end, and what came after? Was that a seizure or just a hiccup or a giggle?), that I'm learning for the first time how to be a mother to a child who is independent and will continue to be so; a child who I hope will live a long life and attend my funeral and scatter my ashes in a place of her choosing, as is the right order of things, or at least the order we think we sign up for when or if we start families.
Ronan was my silent, sweet companion. Charlie talks back, has opinions, ideas, moods, and so many strongly felt emotions that she can express and sometimes name. "I feel lost," she tells me almost wistfully when she's confused, and sometimes, "I'm sad," when she gets pushed at school and she "pushed back so strong" but then clearly feels bad about her actions; or, in New York City, in a hotel room all to ourselves visiting friends, "This is so fun and I'm so happy!" In moments like these, the shift from one parenting experience to another is jarring; the adjustment knocks me off kilter, like a top spinning wildly on a table and falling to the floor, spinning still.
Charlie and I eat the rice and sing "Gorilla in the Sky" (original lyrics and three-line score by me) and then we're off to the grocery store, where I buy Charlie a twenty-dollar enormous princess castle Mylar balloon in exchange for the promise that she will please stay buckled in the cart for thirty minutes while I race through the aisles getting only half of what's on the list, in addition to much that's not on it: a massive cupcake topped with a fist of whipped cream and bright pink candy sprinkles; a box as big as a brick of Goldfish crackers; and bubble bath that makes popping noises as it dissolves in the water, creating a shade of blue that looks like toxic sludge. "I won't drink it!" she promises.
As soon as we arrive home and are headed up the back stairs, stopping to look at lizards, checking out the many birdhouses left in the yard by the previous owners, calling out for Meatball, the stray cat Charlie has named and who we sometimes see skulking through the yard, searching for the tuna and sardines we leave for him on a pink plastic plate, Charlie gets distracted and releases her balloon. "No, wait!" I shout, as if the balloon will mind me. I drop the grocery bags in an effort to save the shiny pink castle from floating up to the top of the tallest palm tree in our wild Southern California yard, where it rocks in the slight breeze, taunting Charlie, the four princesses-Ariel, Rapunzel, Jasmine, Cinderella-slowly rotating past her vision.
"Princesses, no!" Charlie cries, as if they have failed to invite her to the party in the tree. She turns to me. "Why Why Why can't you get it? You're tall! Why?" She stands on her tiptoes and reaches upward with her sticky, sweaty hands, sobbing. After fifteen minutes that feel like a hundred, I am able to coax her, sweating and sniffling and practically hyperventilating, off the porch, where the temperature hovers around 107 degrees. I collect the scattered groceries and pile them on the table, toss the raft of broken eggs in the trash, put the battered milk carton in the refrigerator, and return to a despondent little girl, sitting on the couch with her hands in her lap, silent and sad, floating in an existential, tear-swamped toddler daze. I try every distraction and consolation-so...
