Valerie Harper, TV star of the 70s and 80s, is much in the news. She overcame cancer once, or so it was thought, but now has an inoperable brain tumor and will die from it. And she hasn't much time left.
Her face, always smiling, is on three out of every four magazine covers and is flashed across the TV screen almost daily.
Today I turned on GMA to see her and Mary Tyler Moore, Betty White, Cloris Leachman, Georgia Engle (I think) reunited to talk about their time working together and about Valerie.
Except the interviewer was Katie Couric, who can't keep herself from doing all the talking. So in five minutes, we got about 90 seconds of them, the rest of Katie.
It's true. She talks too much.
But that is not what I started out to say. Here's that:
Valerie Harper said she knows what's ahead but is facing it by living.
"Don't go to the funeral," she said, "until the funeral."
Good counsel.
It's like "Don't try to live tomorrow today." And "Don't cross the bridge until you come to the bridge." Except it is very specific to the probability of death. Well, death is probable for us all. She just happens to know when, more or less, it will happen for her.
I think of this as I have been making sure I know where my life insurance and long term care insurance policies are. Have been asked to update beneficiary information on my investments. Just yesterday poked around in the safe downstairs to review my will and living will and durable power of attorney stuff.
Not that to do so is going to the funeral before the funeral. But it makes one feel closer to death than one--this one--likes to feel. And at my age, when people I know are dying, I can get a little scared.
So, Valerie, thanks for the advice. I take it to heart.
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