gallows humor

Is Lisa Kogan Dead or Something?: And Other News of the Day


Over the past three days I have had an incredible amount of traffic on an old post inspired by a Lisa Kogan column from O Magazine of a year ago. 

In the article, Kogan ponders the possibilities of losing one’s mate. Not literally. She just wonders, as many of the more morbid among us do at some point, what it would be like to be widowed. 

She was trying to be funny and I didn’t find her subject or style too amusing. Not because I don’t have a gallows humor gene – I do. Once, when my late husband was lamenting how much being dead without me was going to suck (he had dementia, remember), I reminded him that time probably flew by much more quickly in the ever-after and that he would eventually have my second husband to keep him company anyway.

He didn’t laugh. Neither did my co-workers when I related the story to them. Probably you aren’t laughing either. 

I suck at the humor thing as much as Lisa Kogan.

But getting back to the sudden surge of her presence in my search terms, I decided to google her to see if anything was up. Maybe she died? Or perhaps she wrote a book and is making the rounds of the talk shows and morning “news” programs. Doug and Annie Brown, the couple who had sex for 101 straight days and then wrote a book about it, (and why I didn’t think of doing that I will never know) show up in the search terms whenever a news article or review about the book turns up. Lisa, however, doesn’t appear to have done anything of late aside from her latest column in O. Which wasn’t that good. In fact, I found it annoying and thought that The Bloggess could have done a better job with the topic.

But I digress – often, yes, I know – there just seem to be an awful lot of people interested in Lisa Kogan. And so far as I could ascertain, she hasn’t died. Which would definitely explain people searching for her. People who read O anyway. But she didn’t. As far as I know.

And why am I writing about search terms?

Because I am still working on Kumari!

Yeah, I know I said it was done. It is, but the revising continues because it’s not quite right. So I signed up for an online writer’s workshop for sci-fi, fantasy and horror writers (I think horror but I can’t remember exactly), and posted it for review. Only one review as yet and it confirmed my opinion that the story is still light and far too staccato as far as flow goes.

Revising is one of those things that either takes off like a brush fire or feels like mental constipation. There is no middle ground. 

I can almost feel the direction I need to go but can’t squeeze the right words out. Once I find the chink in the wall, I know the meat of the story will pour out, but I am not quite there yet. 

Hence this post. Which is my alternative to cleaning or baking or blanching veggies for the freezer. I could have attempted to tempt my husband into a nooner when he was home for lunch instead but we are into day three of a “cleanse” and things are getting fragrantly ugly. No constipation there. Anyway, we just had a nooner, and a nooner habit could become an impediment to say – employment – and we don’t want that. 

What I need to do is re-order a few sentences and paragraphs for flow and tone down the royal “we” of the story’s language and flesh out the character’s parents and the priests a bit. I also need to play up the global warming theme of the setting. I don’t think that is coming out although I don’t want to “go there” in terms of explaining what is happening specifically to the climate/geography. I am not a techie when it comes to sci-fi. More like a Bradbury.

Off to stare at my draft some more. Perhaps it’s like meditation? If I let my mind focus and then drift, it will come to me.

Death at a Funeral


Frank Oz directed a British movie called Death at a Funeral which Rob and I actually watched on purpose last Saturday night. The basic plot revolves around the death of an older man and the funeral service his wife and sons hold for him at their home out in the country. The movie is a comedy, and it is the first death movie that we have viewed, on purpose, since we watched Catch and Release back in the fall. Watching funny movies about the passing of a spouse and father is definitely on the order of gallows humor and oddly I find this type of story even a bit funnier now that I have a first hand perspective of some of the situations at which fun was being poked. For instance there is a scene where a close friend of one of the sons is sitting with the newly widowed mother in the garden – clearly uncomfortable – and trying to cover it with small talk that, as many widowed people can attest to. leads to questions about whether or not the widow/er has thought about remarrying again. As the friend puts it, “You’re young – relatively. Do you think you might marry again?” Withering look of disbelief. “Oh, right. Too soon to talk about that.” I know for myself I was being asked about dating/remarriage prior to my late husband’s death even and at four months my younger sister was inquiring as to the state of status, “So, dating anyone?” Rob’s late mother-in-law let him know at his late wife’s funeral service that she was okay with the fact that he would find someone new someday. Tactless takes on a new meaning from this point of view. It also further illustrates to me just how poorly equipped we are when it comes to dealing with death and the grieving on both sides.

Throughout the course of the family, tense family dynamics are revealed including a secret about the late husband. While it is over the top in that understated English way, it rings true. Family members have roles and almost set in stone ways of reacting and interacting and when something out of the ordinary occurs (although what can be more ordinary than death?) everyone is shaken loose from their moorings and things are done and said that can be more honest than the family business as usual even as they change things for everyone involved.

It was a good film, though, providing laughs and insight.