HeyJaredAmy Oscar: Becoming Real
Writer of spiritual memoir. Spiritual direction for people paying close attention to their lives.
- Indexed issues, last 90 days
- 34
- Latest publication
- Sep 27, 2026
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- Earliest in this view
- Sep 5, 2026
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Tell Them I Love Them (opens the original)
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A few minutes after my father died, he called me.On the telephone.Really.He also called my sisters. Ask them. They’ll tell you.But first, earlier that day, Richard came to visit. Richard, Dad’s friend, had visited him only a few times before, and I never did learn why he chose that afternoon to come again. He took one look at my father, struggling for every breath, and turned to me.“This is an outrage,” he said. “Your father is suffering and he doesn’t have to.”He told me that when his own wife
All the Gates Are Open (opens the original)
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The last time I saw my father, he was suffering. The last time I left him, I prayed his life would end soon.And then, I felt the world tilt.I got into the car to visit him again — and, turning onto the road, something stopped me. Pressure in my chest, as if an invisible hand were holding me back, whispering: Not today.The guidance was so clear that I answered it out loud.“Okay,” I said, and turned the car around.I’d go tomorrow.But I didn’t go. Not that day, nor the next, nor the whole week afte
Please take him (opens the original)
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I didn’t know, walking in that day, that we wouldn’t be going to the river, or playing cards or taking dictation. I didn’t know that my father would never get out of bed again. But that day, I understood. Things were different now.Even after he’d lost the ability to walk, even after he’d been paralyzed on one side, even when he could no longer feed himself, my father had still looked forward to what the day would bring.He watched old movies and sports on television. For a long time, he motored a
Take me to the edge (opens the original)
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I push his wheelchair. He navigates. “Take me to the edge,” he says. “Let me look out.” I wheel him to the end of the patio, where he can see the expansive green lawn, studded with sculptures. A cobblestone path leads down toward the river.“Let’s keep going,” he says. “Off the concrete onto the grass.” He positions us in the middle of the lawn, overlooking the Hudson. “Let’s just listen to the world,” he says.I find a lawn chair and open it beside him. “It’s quiet,” Dad says, “but you hear a lot
“I can’t believe you’re all leaving” (opens the original)
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I dream that we’re all graduating. There’s a big celebration. My friend Lisa is singing her heart out, but we have to move very close to the stage to hear. My son and my daughter come down to the grass. There is one folding chair, upside down and backward. I straighten it so I can sit. Another chair comes, and I point to it, and Katie straightens it. Another comes for Max.We all sit. Lisa sings. The food that I’m eating keeps falling apart in my hands. Then, the man who was singing with Lisa com
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