Which is to say, you can read my revelatory review and think piece "Finding One’s Voice Through Grief: A rumination on My Father’s List by Laura Carney," which includes shout-outs to Yogi Roth, his terrific documentary "Life In A Walk" and my Men's Health piece "Why You Should Talk to Your Dad Like It's His Last Day on Earth," on Yogi and "Life In A Walk," here and / or you may also read some excerpt below. Cool? Excellent.
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"Several years ago I was approached by an editor I was friendly with at a national publication who said, “Hey, you’re the dead dad guy and I have an assignment I think is perfect for you.” The project was a piece on the documentary Life In A Walk and its director Yogi Roth. To quote myself, “In Life In A Walk, we learn how Yogi asked his father, who was battling a second round of prostate cancer, to take a walk through Portugal and Spain along the Camino De Santiago because he wanted to spend more time with him.” One thing that emerged in my conversation with Yogi was that this was not the story of Will (Yogi’s father) the dying guy, it was about Will the guy who was living, kicking-ass, and along with Yogi trying to put as much positivity out into the world as he could. Yogi also wanted to ensure that we all took a moment to call our father’s, to connect, and listen, because at some point we won’t have that option.
"I will admit I cried during the interview. I just cried writing about it. I don’t have the option to call my father, he’s somehow been dead for over twenty years now. Laura Carney, the author of the quite beautifully wrought (and fraught for that matter) My Father’s List doesn’t get to call her father either, which I don’t write to make you cry, though if you do, apologies. Not that I’m the dead father guy because my father died any more than Carney would be the dead father woman because her father died. Lots of us have lost our fathers, though I’ll admit even after all these years I remain amazed how few people have that I know.
"Excluding this, not to mention that I write this with Father’s Day but one week away, my own sons meandering around the house, and my chest tightening ever so slightly with each word, the reason I am a dead dad guy and Carney may yet be a dead dad woman, is that we’ve written about our father’s and their love of life even in the losing of it, a reality that doesn’t fade whether they’re here or not."