Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book Discussion On On My Own 20160729

Different. A College Friend of mine says i am an editor and she probably needs help with events and book festivals now. I call the editor and chief as the nonprofit person and i think a week later i was set up as the associate publisher of the magazine as a volunteer but its pretty much a fulltime job. So then we worked on the infrastructure for the magazine and learn ho learned how to make popular and robust and thats how that job came to be a. What was your selling point . Prior to the research firm. I didnt approach them and i was actually getting some ideas for people. Somebody said what about you. What about me. I ended up talking to them and i was so intimidated at first by the class act i said this is what i believe, this is what i think is exciting. I dont know that i thought much about being a black woman thinking about can i do this job and how do i articulate the successful Board Members that are interviewing me into different fields one is a nonprofit person somewhere in publishing. How do i prove to them i can bring Something Interesting to the foundation . So that is what i was focused on. But in the end, how do you get them really excited about the long form journal, how do you make it feel like that. The same question before the foundation, how do you make people feel excited in literature and make it feel glamorous and exciting without changing what it is how do you open up those doors and ive made the case to do that and now we are going to start to work on it. Being a person of color that gives you a special way of thinking about the audiences. People that look like they feel they are considered the audience whether it is books or television or anything we feel like we are not considered the audience and i think that is demonstrated by my being here. The conversation i was able to have on the professional terms lets think about how to build audiences and because the people excluded you are able to say that the people in rural areas from different economic backgrounds how do you include everybody that wasnt included . It is a big growing the word that we have representatives from cultural organizations, nonprofit that there are folks coming in from outside of the kind of eco chamber which is what the board says. Is it tough to answer to a big board . They are so collaborated and invested in the success because they could be viewed as the party that are capable of stepping back from whatever their role is to say how do we make this bigger. A lot of people say that is a really powerful word. And theyve been the most collaborative and i feel they are confident i can do my job and they are supported by them. They feel 100 having this board makes me feel stronger. They have been wonderful. When does the process began . Is the submission is closed on may 15 which is on monday. So we are in it right after i started off like a whirlwind. I showed up at my desk trying to figure out where the pins are. So very much a role in. All the judges by july 1 they give me a phone call at the end of the summer and let me know the long list. All of a sudden we get a phone call. Tv will b be live at the National Book awards in this november from new york city. Thanks for introducing your self to the booktv audience. The failure to do anything about high prices and failure to do anything about housing, my duty as president requires that i use every means within my power to get the law the people need on such matters of urgency. We will take an early look at the Smithsonian Institute of the history and culture with its director. The museum opens the doors to the public in september of this year. We were able to get a major collection of newspapers such as the ones behind you. Its a movie poster from the 1920s and part of the job is to tell people learn the history they know. Posters from spencer williams, hes known by most as one of the most important film directors in the late 30s and 40s. Historians Annette Gordon reed and ron chernow talk about the process of writing a president ial biography. For the complete American History scheduled to cspan. Org. Npr talkshow host diane reams new book on my own as a memoir about the death of her husband of 54 years and her life since then. She spoke at the book festival. Festival. This is 50 minutes. I want to get immediately to introducing the panelists. First i will just say my name is patrick here to speak with diane reams. Reams. Im a book reviewer and writer and i have a panel at 1 30 about the books that changed my life, my recent anthology. Thats one of the reasons i get the privilege of being near today because i interview authors recently and i love it. I dont think that our panelists need much introduction. However, dianne is the host of a show on npr, and she has been so for many years. We are delighted to have her speak about on my own, her new book. I have lots of questions but i will try to make time for yours. Thank you for being here. It is my pleasure. [applause] diane is a national treasure, and her new book is a very heartfelt one about coming to terms with what life is like after a spouse dies a long marriage and life continues on. Today im going to speak with diane about a great many things in the book that we will havee time to talk about her career in radio and some of her favorite moments. On my own is about being on your own, but its also if you will about a solitary life that has a different tenor if you will. So can you tell us a bit about shaping the essays that make up this book . First of all, i want to thank you all so much for being here. Its a great privilege to be back here at the annapolis festival where john and i spoke back in 2002 on the book about marriage that was titled toward commitment. It is primarily a love story. A love story of mine and the difficulty that one has when one makes a commitment of time and marriage in sickness and in health, vowing to support another life, another person with whom you have lived as it turns out lived with john for 5r years. We were married for 54. John had parkinsons disease and as they became more and more apparent that his parkinsons was taking him downhill he decided to end his life. He did it in a way that still makes me so sad because there was no wall in maryland which allows doctors to assist the individuals that have been deemed. There is no law that allows doctors to help those patients and to stop Drinking Water and stop taking medication. Would you forgive me if i stood up and walked . [applause] im just so much more comfortable. It strikes me as being a little difficult. But i hear a little echo and if we can get that down that would be great. And im sure as most of you know you can go without food for days upon days without food for thought without water within about ten days to two weeks the organs begin to break down without water. John chose to end his life thatn way and i have chosen to write a book that i began writing on the night he was dying i was sleeping trying to sleep on two chairs by his bed with my little dog on my stomach and that didnt work so i just got up at about 2 a. M. I had my ipaq and i began writing. I can tell you there was a no plan at the time to continue to write and somehow to create a book or anything of this sort sb that only knows that night i needed to put on paper what i was feeling and seeing and and so it be thinking so it began. Your ipad, diane there are so many ways to move into that began that night the things that struck me in reading your book and ive read it twice is that it has meaning and its also a great teacher. So perhaps you can speak that night when you begin to write and when you add pieces some of them are letters into some of af them are medications and so on. I think thats the most important learning was that i have to adjust to being alone. Something that i as a woman who went from my parents home to my first brief marriage to my marriage for john had never experienced and the idea of being alone was something that i never even thought about untilsd John Muhammad to move into his assisted living. Whats so curious is that he loved being alone. He loved the quiet silence and he once said to me that a room without words and five is like a drink of water. He would rather have lunch with the new yorker magazine van with any human being and that included me. [laughter] but i knew that about him. But the teaching of the book and the lessons came from recognizing how i could have been a different person. How if i had simply recognized this need to be alone as his need rather than his rejection. That is a powerful statement. You were quite honest about how difficult your marriage was at times due to this misunderstanding due to his own needs and also as you say towards the beginning of the book, he admitted very late in his illness that he felt he had been emotionally abusive. That is a tough thing not just to hear but to share. And i wonder if you might share more with us about why a very difficult marriage could also be a very rewarding, rich and loving marriage. So many people asked me why would you include such a painful admission onto his part. Diane, i apologize to you because i was deliberately emotionally abusive towards you. Why would i write that . And i think its first came out of my heart it was something i had to include, but it was also to demonstrate how the marriage of such mixed emotions and experi experiences can truly be a successful marriage. There are no perfect marriages that i know of. Maybe out there. Maybe you regard your marriage as absolutely perfect. Ours was not. And yes from all perspectives it was a successful marriage. I remember walking into the pediatricians office with ourso son was probably about eight or nine and the doctors said to me tell me your secret. What is it about you that makesa you so compatible that weeks your marriage is so good . His marriage was breaking up so i think that that was part of the reason i wanted to put that in to say not only to myself because i had to hear it and it was like i knew he had that feeling and had been specifically and deliberately, emotionally abusive to hear itto come from his mouth was Something Else again. Statement t that is such an amazing statement and the reason i want to pick that up is because one of the reasons you say in the book that youve become such an good o advocate, that is your phrase and a good one, you were denied a final intimacy. It gives me chills to say that, being able to be with john at the last and its because of this process, it was because he could not have agency and aid in dying. So it isnt just about being told something important, its also about sharing every part of and the la life. And the last moments of life after that last night when his caregiver arrived at 7 30 in the morning i said im going to take him home, feed him, shower and then be right back. Got home, i wow, after i got home i got a call from the caregiver saying please come quickly, he is going. Re and by the time i got there it was 20 minutes too late. Ving spt having spent the night there,hae wanting to hold his hand at the last became frustrating to me and as i think of it now its extremely hard to bear. Had he the right to die, he would have medication that he would have opted to take or not and he would have informed me when he was going to take it and i could have been there with him as far as im sure you know the ha Maryland State Legislature has rejected the bill that has now been introduced to her three times so far it hasnt passed. There are three states that a guard against and most recently with california. I think that legislation is going to move throughout the country and people eventually will have that right to choose [inaudible] i im sorry, your microphone is gone. Lets get her microphone back on. There it is. By the sorry. So heres what i mean by the right to choose. I believe in god. Im a strong believer in god. And there are those among us all believe in god believe that it is only gods timing that matters and if that is your belief, i strongly support it. You should be able to say i will be here on this planet until god decides it is time for me to go. If, for example, you find yourself very ill and you wish for your doctor to not only continue to try every means possible to keep you alive and then to offer to you simply care to keep you comfortable with, i totally support that. If on the other hand, you find yourself as john david, unable to feed herself and to walk from your bed to the bathroom and unable to care in any way and you wish to have that right to choose, i support that as well. It is the right to choose. [applause] book that you say in the book that probably it will take another ten or 20 years like Marriage Equality took a while to getand hold. One of the other things thats quite interesting is to hear about your accidental advocacy because you believe strongly that you didnt become a public figure speaking on behalf of all on your own. It happened because of some event and some talks of things you got involved in and now this is the important part. Now you want to once youve retired. It will take me a moment for that. You want to work on moving to fulltime and so i want to give you some time to speak at thesi. Public side. Ington post who the Washington Post labeled me a new and strong advocate for the right to die after i hadnded attended three dinners sponsored by compassionate choices. They did these dinners as a fundraising vehicle and felt st very strongly that my presence would attract large donors. Each of those was for 20 each20 of whom paid 2,500 to attend. At those dinners i did nothing but speak of john. And to speak of how he died and my belief that he should have had choice. Npr and my own station felt that by attending those dinners i had crossed a line of journalisticwt ethical behavior with which i didnt agree. I had already attended tonpr fo, dinners the folks and i all came together and we all together and agreed that since i was committed to a third dinner i would attend the dinner and then no more. And i agreed to that with regret and i said i am very sad that it has come to this because i do not feel that i was in ani was advocacy position, i was there talking about going on husband. I want to correct one word you said. I am not retiring. [laughter] [applause] i stand corrected. I am simply stepping away from the microphone after 37 years of doing two hours a day, ten hours a week of the diane i rehm show. I will be 80 in september and it is time for someone else to have pets real estate. [applause] so, we are in the process of thinking very hard and very carefully about what comes next and the management has been in touch with so many people in so many stations and has been involved in something really good that will come into those two hours. I really believe that. I will miss being with all of you everyday. There is no question that im going on to do other things. I have appeared in a play about alzheimers, and weve done that in washington and la and sann diego and boston, indianapolis and we plan to continue taking it around the country. Im also going to be speaking out wherever i masked on the right to choose. I want to be very clear about that as opposed to saying you and i and everyone else should have the right to die. Im saying you should have the right to choose. And i hope that it comes to. No retirement however. I know in the book you let us know saturdays are your day to sleep in. So what will saturday look like later this year for you . I imagine it will be quite a luxury. Luxury. Saturday saturdays will be marvelous. [laughter] i have been getting up at 5 a. M. For the last 37 years and more because i supervise my now 56yearold sons piano practice each morning so i used to get up at 5 00 with him and supervise that. So i got in the habit early on in our married life is getting up early and there were times ie was freelancing for theio Associated Press Radio Network where i would have to get up at 4 00 into the downtown. I dont know. I am just going to hope that she stays well. She is now a 13yearold longhaired chihuahua and has at copy of the book i wrote about maxine and he is my beloved. I talk with him and john every single day and he talks back to me which is wonderful. The saddest part came two days after his Memorial Service when i got a telephone call telling me that i would be awarded the president ial medal for thehuman. Humanities and i thought why couldnt he have lived to see fy this . He was my chant the first day that i volunteered on the little station on the campus of the american university. If you went around the curb you couldnt hear the station anymore. [laughter] but i came home this is 1973 npr got off the ground in 1970 and so it wasnt even a member at that time. You have to have five fulltime employees to be a member of npr, and we did not. I came home from my first day as a volunteer at the station and honestly this is so hard to believe way back then, john rehm said to me someday you will be the host of the program. So he dreamed for me and saw ahead for me in ways i couldnt see for myself. Now contrast that with what we talked about earlier, the tension and the difficulties in marriage. Its so complicated. Marriage is the hardest job in the world next to parenthood. [laughter] thats very true. I have a couple smaller questions but since you just spoke about john again, one ofye the things i wanted to mention is you talk at the end of the book about missing him more and so often in our society we think grief has a time and ends but this isnt actually morning that youre talking about missing him more. I would like to have you expand on that. E ds he went to the seminary with Malcolm Brown as the New York Times he won a pulitzer for his coverage of vietnam along with a number of other reporters. Malcolm married a woman from vietnam, and malcolm unfortunately came down with parkinsons at about the same time john did. He died two years before john. His wife sent me a note saying n miss him more, even now. And i was struck by that comment because here we are almost at the second anniversary, and i find myself missing him even more now. Aftermath of the death one is i was so busy readjusting my life and so busy with so many things that i threw myself into work. And as elmer cliff says in the book, i ran as hard as i i could from grief. Just trying to keep busy. So i think now that we are where we are in the timeline, i really do believe i am allowing myself to the feel the grief and his absence even more now. And that, of course, it brings you to being on your own. And now that youre on your own, a couple of questions. Again, so i love the fact that john would ask for a hike to now what are you reading for pleasure . Where will that come a bit later when you step away . I can confine my nightd. Time reading to fiction and. So anything that is eave vents related your newsreader they did that night i tried to calm down. To try to get away that it is catastrophic right now as we think about the newss poetically and what is goingl of on as we think about all of the evil. Because that will be the revie review. And it is a dark book. But she writes very compellingly. I wanted to open up the fourth few extra minutes and again if you come to the can form a lin microphone to make sure things go smoothly. Open mike night. Go right ahead. The delay. I have a comment. We all we love you being in our allies and the will miss you a but youre the most wonderful light. [applause] that is so very kind of you. I read a book recently by dr. Joyce brothers and four women would recommend them to read it. I dont have a question that i would like to recommend that book it is older but it shows what you have gone through with some loss. I do think it is a great recommendation anybody who becomes a widow or widower experiences life individually. Lly does depend o here really does depend if you are blessed enough to have friends and relatives nearby to support you that is so individual i think there are no easy formulas that is why i did not intend to write one so thank you for that recommendation. Thanks for your remarks i heard so many times somebody weighted by the bedside and then left for a few minutes early for them to die. It appears it is often the choice the person makes. Even the nurses said exactly that to me when iot got back and i was sogh devastated the to have spent there second might have been a choice. Exactly. And feeling the absencece and i would agree those that like to run do so even harder but after a while if it simplifies in your mind you remember the best complicated things. You are so right and i stopped myself now seen john as a young man totally in love and totally involved in attorney at the state department so that his life was professionally focused hello. The ku. Ed is an honor as the wife and mother and a professional you nailed it when you said all of those things and something that struck me was he had dreams for you and i imagine you had dreams for him so how does that help you getos through as a mom or as a wife or professional . That is a great question frankly, the therapy. [laughter] twenty [applause] twentyfive years of therapy we are on it. Good for you. Ears. Thank you [laughter] in the way to listen to everybody but sometimes i find myself and to we lose interest or lose track of i mean, im human. G. Man there are some things of which i am pharmor interested than what is happening to the shoreline and killed whole question of how the environment is changing doesnt go toward the one little bit. Ill afford to read your book but how did thean hospital react your husbands choice . After having been a caregiver for right own parents night is found until we got to hospice doctors just want to keep trying everything so i was just wondering if he had any push back . That is such a good leads mes question to say to everybody