BUT DEATH SEEMS “SO FAR AWAY”: LIFE LESSONS FROM TWO VERY DIFFERENT PATHS OF PARENTAL LOSS

Each of us will, eventually, die. But before we do, each of us will experience the deaths of individuals that we love. Yet, we all have a tendency to deny this fact; we put off discussions with our families about our wishes for our own end of life, and we put off discussions with our families about their wishes for their own end of life. From this almost universal human tendency for avoidance comes the titular phrase of Christine Hartmann’s gripping memoir of her own parents ’ deaths, inspired in part by her parents ’ tendencies to put off such conver-sations with her, noting that the time was “so far away. ” Dr. Hartmann, a health services researcher and social worker, has written a gripping mem-oir of her strongly contrasting but equally tragi