Celebrities Speaking Up About Grief: Volume 14
/ Books, Movies, and Music : Litsa Williams
Okay, I am officially the worst at keeping up with this series. I looked back to see when the last volume came and it was in 2015! What can I say? I’m sorry.
Luckily, this week there was a lot of celebrity grief news and comments, prompting us to revitalize this series. We realize that your Twitter feed may not be filled with all sorts of grief-y blogs and outlets like ours is, so we wanted to make sure you didn’t miss any of the great ways celebrities have been speaking up about grief lately.
Patton Oswalt On Grief
If you have heard anything about celebrities and grief this week, our guess is that it was about Patton Oswalt’s Facebook post about coping with the death of his wife. His wife died very unexpectedly back in April and Patton shared his thoughts on the first 102 days since her death. You really should check out the whole post, but here is a little teaser to motivate you.
“If you spend 102 days completely focused on ONE thing, you can achieve miracles. Make a film, write a novel, get MMA ripped, kick heroin, learn a language, travel around the world. Fall in love with someone. Get ’em to love you back.
But 102 days at the mercy of grief and loss feels like 102 years and you have shit to show for it. You will not be physically healthier. You will not feel “wiser.” You will not have “closure.” You will not have “perspective” or “resilience” or “a new sense of self.” You WILL have solid knowledge of fear, exhaustion and a new appreciation for the randomness and horror of the universe. And you’ll also realize that 102 days is nothing but a warm-up for things to come”.
Sheryl Sandberg Scores A Grief Book Deal
Thirty days after her husband’s death, Sherly Sandberg wrote a pretty great Facebook post on grief. Like many others who read it, we awed at the raw honesty of her words and her amazing perspective only 30 days out from her loss… We also knew that, sadly, things were only going to get harder for her before they got easier. If you missed that post back in June of 2015, you should go check it out now. As a reminder, this was the post where she famously said:
“I can’t even express the gratitude I feel to my family and friends who have done so much and reassured me that they will continue to be there. In the brutal moments when I am overtaken by the void, when the months and years stretch out in front of me endless and empty, only their faces pull me out of the isolation and fear. My appreciation for them knows no bounds.
I was talking to one of these friends about a father-child activity that Dave is not here to do. We came up with a plan to fill in for Dave. I cried to him, “But I want Dave. I want option A.” He put his arm around me and said, “Option A is not available. So let’s just kick the shit out of option B.”
I remember reading that and thinking: Wow, that would be a great title for a grief memoir. Luckily that wasn’t lost on Sheryl (who clearly isn’t COO of Facebook for nothing!), as she just announced that she will be releasing a book on grief titled “Option B”. We are pretty excited about this and, if you aren’t excited yet, check out Sandberg’s UC Berkeley Commencement speech and you might find yourself a little more amped up for the book.