Luke Austin Daugherty & Dad, Joe Daugherty, in Sept. 1978
It is a hell of a thing to lose somebody you love deeply. And just with the passing of time, it doesn’t cease to be a hell of a thing. Time may knock the edges off of your hurt, but it never completely goes away. At least the hurt from losing my father hasn’t dissipated after six years. I don’t even think that is a bad thing.
I am very close to being finished with the final edit of “Love is the Middle: The True Story of a Father and Son.” For more information on the book, please visit this link to a previous blog: Love is the Middle: Thoughts on Finishing Draft One
I find that it is helpful when editing, not only to read the text through normally, but also once through aloud. Doing so, at least for me, forces a slower pace and I catch mistakes that I would otherwise miss.
With that in mind, I decided that for my out-loud reading of “Love is the Middle,” I would just read the book to my kids about a chapter per day over the course of a few weeks.As of today, we only have a few chapters left and I have enjoyed reading the story to them.
The chapter we read today was about when my dad told me that he had cancer and the three years leading up to his death. Reading that chapter to my kids, like several other sections of the book, was difficult. Since I wrote the entire book in a number of coffee shops, I was forced to visit many deep emotions in a public setting. It was one thing to write the book with all of my internal dialogue quietly being translated into text on a laptop by my fingers . But, I have found that vocalizing those same words to my children is quite a bit more difficult. I not only “think” the words, but hear my own words. The mere act of speaking some of the stories in the book versus only reading them has been quite a chore at times. But, I have managed through the book so far.
As I finished up today’s chapter, which included a story about the last full “normal” day I ever spent with my dad, reading became harder for me. Then, when I saw the next chapter to come, the one that tells the account of my dad’s death and the days surrounding it, I realized that I cannot do my duty tomorrow. When I only contemplated reading that chapter aloud, I quickly realized that it would be beyond the scope of my ability. Or, if not beyond my ability, beyond what I desire to do.
I suppose I will just let the kids read the rest of the book through on their own or perhaps my wife will read it to them. But, not me. It would just be too damn hard to speak all of the remaining words. Since I have not had much luck so far predicting how the book will hit me emotionally, I have no desire to break down crying like a child in front of my children. I think that would be the most likely outcome. Rarely do I hold back my emotions from my children, but some of them need to be for only me.
I hasten to complete and publish the book. I hope you will read and share it.
-Luke
Luke Austin Daugherty 