These Precious Days: Essays

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A friend who was well versed in the experience brought them over early in the morning on Memorial Day. The rain went on for another half an hour, and when it gave up I put Sparky on his leash and the three of us went outside to wander and gape with our neighbors. I told them that when I was a child, my sister and I would come to the Ryman on Friday and Saturday nights with the man who was then the house doctor at the Opry.

A typical Patchett piece is a eulogy, suitably warm and affectionate, respectful to those who have died, or are about to die. Sooki didn’t talk about her husband or her children or her friends or her employer; she talked about color. I need to go home,” she said, looking at the pictures of herself she had asked me to take with her cell phone.These Precious Days is no exception and the best of those I’ve read in 2021 — All of the essays in this collection are at least good, almost all great. My cousin introduced me years ago to the wonders of Ann Patchett’s fictional stories like Bel Canto and The Magician’s Assistant.

This is now February 2020, a time leading into the Global Pandemic, but we didn’t really know that then. When Patchett learns that the only treatment trial for Raphael's newly diagnosed pancreatic cancer is at a Nashville hospital, she invites her to live with her and her husband during the treatment. Many nights after dinner, I would ask Karl where Sooki was and then we would start looking around for her.The thought of Tom Hanks benefiting from my assistance struck me as funny, and then I forgot about it. I had interviews scheduled all day on Tuesday, Sooki had chemo on Wednesday, and my friends were leaving for California on Thursday. Sooki and I stood together in the kitchen, one of us washing the vegetables, the other one chopping, making it up as we went along. Sookie needed the same things—to find somebody who could see each other’s best and most complete selves. After dinner that night, Sooki and I sat on the couch and tried to watch a movie, but her phone on its leash began to ding and ding and ding, insisting on her attention.