It then becomes clear that there are different degrees of unbearable. ![]() If you’ve ever been in a hospice, you know that there are stories of people who leave alive, and you always hope that might be your person.Īt one point, they hear a baby crying in the hospice and wonder who on earth would bring a baby to a hospice, only later realizing that the baby is a patient. The patient in the room next to Edi watches “Fiddler on the Roof” from morning until night, and she and another man in the hospice are needing their rooms for much longer than expected. There’s a cheese-loving golden retriever named Farrah Fawcett who runs from room to room a handsome guitar player who strums James Taylor, Joni Mitchell and the Beatles a doctor who looks so much like James Gandolfini they nickname him Dr. The hospice is a warm, soft place where everyone has the vibe of a gentle hug. (Every time the rabbi saw me he would sing, “Maybe in a HOUSE. I texted my brothers at the part when, as a 10-year-old, Edi recorded herself singing “Maybe” from “Annie” over her brother’s Torah portion I, too, found a tape recorder and microphone too attractive to resist. Perhaps because I’m of similar age to Ash and Edi and grew up in the New York metropolitan area with the same local commercials (Crazy Eddie, Technical Career Institute), I had so many sparks of recognition. About oversubscribed facilities, she writes: “‘Wait list? Do they understand the premise of hospice?’ We pictured an intake coordinator making endless calls, crossing name after name off her list. Newman’s voice is hilarious and warm her characters feel like old friends. It is excruciatingly heartbreaking, but I laughed out loud on almost every page. Her sweet ex-ish husband, Honey, lives nearby and comes over to cook, fix things, bring weed and offer general comfort. Recently separated (“too cheap and lazy to get an actual divorce”), Ash lives with her two mostly grown daughters. The thought is unbearable to Edi and her husband, Jude - until it becomes the one thing in this horrible time that makes sense. After learning that local facilities have a waiting list, Ash suggests a place near where she now lives in western Massachusetts. ![]() ![]() The social worker recommends inpatient hospice care, to spare Edi’s 7-year-old son the trauma of watching his mother die at home. Now, Edi has ovarian cancer and, after three years of grueling treatments, the hospital social worker delivers the “ make the most of her remaining days talk - while simultaneously clarifying that this most-making would need to happen not there.” To add insult to terminal illness, Edi needs to be out of the hospital by the next day. “Everything I Never Told You,” “The Fault in Our Stars,” “Lily and the Octopus” and now “We All Want Impossible Things,” Catherine Newman’s debut novel for adults.Īshley and Edith (Ash and Edi) have been best friends since they were kids growing up five blocks apart in Manhattan. There is a type of book that I like to refer to as “really too sad for my taste, but so good I couldn’t put it down, and now I have to tell everyone I know they have to read it.” It’s a long title for a genre, but it comes in handy. WE ALL WANT IMPOSSIBLE THINGS, by Catherine Newman
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