Life's That Way: A Memoir

LIFE'S THAT WAY, by Jim Beaver A Review I confess to having some trouble figuring out how to write this review. Not because the book isn't remarkable - it is - but because I did not want to cheapen its import with a casual splash of words. This book means something to me. As a cancer survivor, I found it means more than I can easily express. "Life's That Way" is, foremost of all, a love story and a testament to the human spirit. Jim Beaver does not portray his wife as a flawless woman, nor paint himself as a perfect man. Rather he says, look, we're all kinda screwy, but that's just a little dust on the furniture. Loving someone, that's what truly counts. Jim's writing style is of such candid feeling that it gives the book a rare grace and readability. The immediacy of the narrative, however, is what struck me most. Presented here are emails and messages in present tense, things that happened now, today, not five years ago. Today Jim talked to Cecily's doctor, today Cecily got her MRI results, today Maddie asked why Daddy was cwying. I think this is what makes the book's reality so poignant. It is why I read each entry on Cecily's illness as if following the battle of a friend, so immersed in the story that I forgot this is already done. It is certainly why, when Jim wrote of her death in the terse language of the utterly bereaved, I had to walk away. I had to put the book down and go wrap my mind around the finality of Cecily's loss, despite knowing that she is these five years gone. When I resumed reading, it was an amazing voyage. Sometimes I felt like an invisible voyeur, that I shouldn't know this much about another's pain. But lest you think this is a tale of unremitting sadness, know this: it is not. What shines throughout is the fierceness of Hope. Every time the darkness falls, every time tears hit like a monsoon storm, Jim picks himself up and goes on. Every step of Cecily's illness, Jim's hope burned unceasing. He speaks with awe of the support of friends, and does not concede the fight for an instant. Even in his darkest days, he reminds us that we're all just human beings. Contrary to the movies, we do not suffer nobly and sometimes we're just plain petty. But it's okay, because if you love, really love someone, you can make the little stuff just not matter. After Cecily's death, Jim is a man at Ground Zero of heartache, the smoke and ash of his dreams all around him. But as his brother-friend, Tom Allard reminds him, "Life's that way." Not in tones of fatalism or inevitability, but as a form of direction: Life's that way. Go. Find it. It's still out there. And it is. Where Jim finds life is an ongoing saga of little, everyday miracles. Maddie's growth and development. Friends who help. Family who cares. Gifts of chance and gifts of love, deeds of caring and deeds of practicality, (a theater troupe helps Jim move into his and Cecily's new home) and random acts of kindness from so many loving hear

Life's That Way: A Memoir I thought this book would be sad,but i wasn't expecting the moving love story. It was the most beautifully written,love letter to his dear Pie. It was sad,but uplifting in that no matter how much we grief we still LOVE. It was a true tribute not only to her,but to their love.I know through this book his daughter will gain the greatest insight into what a beautiful woman his dear Pie really was. It was also very heartfelt in how he dealt with not only the cancer but in being a single parent. I know any parent reading this book will understand the great love and fear he had for his daughter and in his ability to be the parent she deserved. This book should be in everyone's home!

Jim Beaver's book, "Life's That Way," came out on April 16th. This book is his memoir, a poignant compilation of the almost nightly emails chronicling his wife's battle with cancer, their hopes and fears for their daughter who had just been diagnosed with autism and the condition of his father and brother-in-law who were also in battles for their lives. While these emails began as a utilitarian method of communicating the daily news and travails of their family, they morphed into so much more. They became therapeutic for him as well as the nearly 4000 people who eventually were reading about this journey. The easy path would have been to give into the despair, rage at the world for its injustices, and withdraw....but he slowly worked his way down the hardest path of his life choosing even in his darkest moments to live each day as best he could; some days that was in tears, other days it was with a smile. In the weeks and months following Cecily's passing and the raising of Maddie as a widowed father, Jim continued to find strength and motivation in his writing of the nightly letter to friends and loved ones. He writes candidly with acceptance, compassion, and humor about his progression from being consumed by sadness and grief to being able once again to truly live life. The book is not an easy read. I cried many a time over various entries, but I laughed too, and it is undoubtedly the best book I have read in years. He has an innate way of finding the genuineness in even the most desolate times and moving hearts by sharing his. It is a deeply poignant, extremely inspirational story of discovering courage in the face of astonishing and tragic loss, holding onto love in the face of fear, and an absolute refusal to live in self-pity and anger even though those feelings were almost constant companions. Anyone who has been in his shoes and felt the weight of overwhelming emotion or been in a situation comprised of seemingly overwhelming odds can find much inspiration in his words. There is no magic panacea to be found here, but it will help because it's just honest and loving and genuine in its telling of the fact that "Life's That Way' and it's waiting for us to reach out and head toward it.

A sweet, heartbreaking, inspiring, and yes funny, slice of life is recorded in the emails of Jim Beaver's Life's That Way. Early in the book, I realized that my preconceptions of the title and the subject were in error. Life's That Way isn't the passive equivalent of "life is like that" and there is nothing we can do. Life's That Way is pointing in a direction and making a conscious decision to not give up, to be anything but passive, and to run or walk and sometimes crawl toward Life again. For anyone that has experienced an intimate loss, which is most of us, this will be an emotional reading. But the reward is Jim's honesty and bravery in reporting his feelings, feelings that sometimes as survivors we don't even want to admit having, but ultimately connect us through being human. The book is a lovely tribute to the tenacity of spirit of Cecily, Jim, and their daughter Madeline Rose.

This book was edited from an email journal actor Jim Beaver (Deadwood, Supernatural, Harper's Island) wrote each night for a year in 2003-4 to keep family and friends informed about his wife Cecily's desperate fight against cancer, and after her loss, about how he and his very young daughter Maddie continued on with their lives. There is grief here, together with brutally raw and honest pain, anger, fear, helplessness, guilt, and despair - but there is also joy, laughter, and hope, and most of all, there is love: Jim's love for his wife and daughter, their love for him, and the amazing outpouring of love and help from family, friends, and even strangers who responded to Cecily's struggle and its impact on others. For anyone dealing with love and loss, this book has hope to offer and lessons in life to teach, all without a word of preaching. If you've loved and lost someone - parent, spouse, child, friend, lover - you've felt what's in this book, and reading it might help bring you healing, if only by letting you know that you are not alone in what and how you feel and by giving you the means and words to talk about it. I'm watching my mother being stolen by Alzheimer's, and this book speaks to me even in the midst of ongoing loss. Read it, and take comfort.