A Short History of Falling: Everything I Observed About Love Whilst Dying
By: Joe Hammond / Narrated By: Russell Tovey
Length: 5 hrs and 26 mins
Well-written, well-narrated. BeYONd heartbreaking, yet so very loving
P’raps I should open with: I listened to A Short History of Falling cuz I was having a reeeally cruddy day (Ailments, ailments due to side effects from meds for ailments, no sleep the night before punctuated by horrific nightmares), and gosh! I was having a really hard time finding gratitude. Heck, finding ANY sense of just plain “feeling” of any kind. I was thinking that here with this story was The Worst Case Scenario, a young(ish) man who has to leave his wife and two very young boys behind because he’s been diagnosed with motor neurone disease (ALS). This, jeez, to me at any rate, is kinda sorta the way I do NOT wanna Leave This Earth.
But what happens? ImMEDiately I’m sorta chuckling because author Joe Hammond is talking about the indignity of falling. His son once upon a time used to ugly cry to see his beloved father splayed on the floor. Now, however, little Tom merely glances at him as he gingerly steps over the sprawled body. At one time, Hammond was the king of the slapstick moment, the guy who’d do anything for a laugh, and now he’s simply trying to figure out some way to maneuver himself into ANY way he can maaaybe manage to get up, like, BEFORE the dinner guests come in to see what-all the commotion is.
It’s poignant, but it’s funny at the same time.
Which is NOT to say that this audiobook will have you spewing liquids from your mouth as you choke in laughter. It starts funny, it has MANY bouts of drop dead wit. But here’s the thing:
It’s light. This death of an extraordinary man is light, because Hammond is buoyant. He’s let go of emotional anguish, he’s let go of Hope, and bit by bit, as we travel with him on this journey that he’s invited us to, he’s let go of his body, piece by piece, muscle and nerves dying beneath a touch of his fingertips.
What starts as a possible brain tumor winds up being something along the lines of: We’ve ruled out everything else, and GOD we tried finding ANYthing else, sooo, this is what you’ve got. This is how your Life will go, how your Life will End. The response? With a single glance, he sees that his wife Gill is broken open, tears streaming down her face as she sees how shattered he is. His pain is her pain, the way it goes with loving someone. And five days of disintegration, five days of his walls, his dam breaking, leave him calmer, more in control. It’s not that he’ll fight the disease; after all, it’ll most certainly Win in the end. It’s more that he can look at the pages of his life, all of them, and he can be with them, in them, weighing and assessing. Observing and accepting.
There is sooo much about how to look at the Past, how to honor the pain, the screwed up situations, how to see people, let them go, acknowledge that their Journeys can be so very different from what we’d like them to be. His father? It has to be all about him; no room for a dying son. His mother? She just doesn’t know how to cope, can’t keep the horror from her expression as she tries to Be There.
And he holds no grudges. He simply navigates his past, exhumes exCEEdingly painful episodes (Think: Killing a motorcyclist just after he got his driver’s license… sooo not his fault, but how do you get past something like that?), brings to light not only those who’ve caused pain, but those whom he might’ve damaged and who made him a better person. Leaves of loveliness, falling to the ground, staying with him.
This is about grief, yes, about letting go, yes. It’s about how in Hospice (At least in the UK a few years ago), death and grief are ho-hum, such everyday affairs that dying is simply an act that needs to get done on a daily basis. But outside Hospice? Where’s the death? Nobody knows how to be with the dying. Except for maybe the buddy from Ireland, where Death is just as celebrated as a Birth or a Marriage.
Russell Tovey does a truly admirable job here as there’s so very much to navigate. There are the constantly shifting emotions brought on from painful memories which might morph into heartfelt acknowledgments and then onto a joke; there is the young family as they wander through this new and unwanted territory; there is Hammond himself as he moves from Slapstick King with the ever-present pratfall up his sleeve to Slapstick King who’s decided Dignity can be foregone, just I Hope The Nurses Land Me Properly on the too small commode, forget about adjusting the towel over shriveled privates seeing as how his naked behind is being flashed to onlookers. Everything is mined to see what it actually means to this man on his journey, and Tovey delivers it all with humor or with gravitas. You never know which it’ll be, but soon you realize?
Both.
Simply beautiful, and gonna be cliché here and tell you it’s Life Affirming as all get-out.
Did I feel gratitude for my able body that was suffering ailments but was NOT killing me? Yes. Did I feel awe that motor neurone disease could be a beautifully handled Exploration, skillfully piloted, something I never would’ve thought possible? Indubitably.
Did I laugh, did I cry? Oh my yes, but…
Mostly I felt light. Because, you see, Hammond showed me how to Live, just in that precious moment. I’ll feel all cruddy again, most certainly. But memories? Listen to this, and tell me if you don’t get even just one simple inkling on how to let go with one hand, all while grabbing for all that’s good and pure with the other.
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