Robert Gottschlich's Blog - Posts Tagged "memoir"

“I get my journal and start to write. It is, I will realize later, my saving grace. No matter if it's good or bad, the writing is mine, done on my time, in my head and I need it like I need air right now.”

Excerpt From: Gottschlich, Robert. “Ten Acres in Malibu.” BookBaby, 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00. iBooks.
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“Peter is an unhappy man. Underneath the dementia that surges and falls back like some rapacious, ransacking horde and the diabetes that eats at his extremities like termites at wood, he is aging ungracefully and the sparks of discontent fly off him at all times of the day. Mornings, however, are his worst time.”

Excerpt From: Gottschlich, Robert. “Ten Acres in Malibu.”

They loved this man so much. I saw it before but not the whole of it. Flashes of it, maybe. Sudden tears. Outbreaks of angry pain. By the time I came on board, they had already lost so much of him to his illness, his dementia. As often as not, he was a stranger to them, distant and brittle; sometimes harsh, at others crazed. Now in death, he has come back to them, defenseless and ready to be loved and praised. Everyone hugs me and tells me the same thing.

  “You did a wonderful job with Peter. Thank you so very, very much.”

    I was Peter's right hand man. His man Friday. I loved him. I was meant to take care of him and I was proud of the job I did.

Excerpt From: Gottschlich, Robert. “Ten Acres in Malibu.”

We're standing in the small clearing behind the guesthouse. Peter is watching Deal or no deal on TV. While Jan enjoys a secret cigarette, I watch the fog burn off the pink rocks on the hill above the property, revealing mustard plants in yellow ribbons a few bushes at a time. Jan puts her ciggy out on the sole of one of her white therapeutic shoes and puts the butt back into the red and white Marlboro box. She peels open a bag of Planter's Spanish peanuts. “I'm sorry if your parents are dead or something,” she says into my silence.