Leave the Dogs at Home: A Memoir

by Claire S. Arbogast, Carrol Ann Krause, Jesse Lee Kercheval, Barbara Shoup, B.J. Hollars

Overview

Claire and Jim were friends, lovers, and sometimes enemies for 27 years. In order to get health insurance, they finally married, calling their anniversary the "It Means Absolutely Nothing" day. Then Jim was diagnosed with cancer. With ever-decreasing odds of survival, punctuated by arcs of false hope, Jim's deteriorating health altered their well-established independence as they became caregiver and patient, sharing intimacy as close as their own breaths. A year and a half into their marriage, Jim died from lung/brain cancer. Sustained by good dogs and gardening through the two years of madness that followed, Claire soldiered through home repairs, career disaster, genealogy quests, and "dating for seniors" trying to build a better life on the debris of her old one. Leave the Dogs at Home maps and plays with the stages of grief. Delightfully confessional, it challenges persistent, yet outdated, societal norms about relationships, and finds relief in whimsy, pop culture, and renewed spirituality.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780253017192
Publisher:	Indiana University Press
Publication date:	07/03/2015
Series:	Break Away Books
Edition description:	Break Away Book Club Edition
Pages:	238
Product dimensions:	5.25(w) x 8.00(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Claire Arbogast is a graduate of Indiana University. She gardens, walks with dogs, and writes in Bloomington, Indiana. Her website is www.ClaireArbogast.com

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
1 The Fullness
2 Survivor
3 Waterloo
4 Terminal Restlessness
5 Buzzing
6 Line of Salt
7 Drainage
8 Consilience
9 Balancing Concentrate
10 Swoop
11 The In Between
12 The Point of Surrender
13 The Shitty Truth
14 Fumes
15 Finding Boxerwood
16 Crabbottom Grits
17 Peripheral Vision
18 Six Years Later: New Tricks
Credits

What People are Saying About This

"By the time I finished reading Leave the Dogs at Home, I felt sure I was holding a future classic. The best thing about Claire Arbogast, besides her wonderful writing, is her hard-headed sense of intimacy and her stubborn determination to live a life of love—whatever craziness and jury-rigging that might require from the heart."

Creative Director, Women Writing for (a) Change of Bloomington, IN - Beth Lodge-Rigal

Leave the Dogs at Home mines the messy, graceful territory of life lived in the midst of upheaval; the roughness and tenderness of it all.  Sharp and engaging, this beautiful memoir invites us to think about resilience and reconnection with the strongest parts of Self.

Managing Director, Boxerwood Nature Center and Woodland Garden - Bruce W. Bytnar

Life, just as a garden, does not have to be perfect and neat to be complete. Leave the Dogs at Home serves as a prime example of how a humble experience in the outdoors can come to our aid in times of need and healing.

Jesse Lee Kercheval

Leave the Dogs at Home is a memoir for and about adults and their very real lives. Claire and Jim take nearly a lifetime to move into marriage only to discover Jim has terminal cancer. But this is not so much a book about grief as it is about love. Readers will share that love and arrive at the end both stronger and wiser.

Bob Shacochis]]>

By the time I finished reading Leave the Dogs at Home, I felt sure I was holding a future classic. The best thing about Claire Arbogast, besides her wonderful writing, is her hard-headed sense of intimacy and her stubborn determination to live a life of love—whatever craziness and jury-rigging that might require from the heart.

Carrol Krause

Claire Arbogast's deeply moving memoir records with honesty and clarity how she managed to move forward with her life despite the death of her husband. Her story beautifully depicts the aftermath of deep personal loss.

Barbara Shoup

Claire Arbogast rewrites the stages of grief in this raw, sometimes unsettling, always compelling memoir that takes us backward and forward in time from the moment her intense, complicated husband is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Leave the Dogs at Home challenges the conventional wisdom about love, marriage, loss, survival, and grace in ways that are bound to make you think about your own life.

B.J. Hollars]]>

In this stunning debut, Claire Arbogast infuses death with life, giving readers both the gut-punch of grief as well as the warmth of a life well lived. Candid, powerful, and unrelenting, Arbogast's pain becomes our pain, and her love becomes our love.

Bob Shacochis

By the time I finished reading Leave the Dogs at Home, I felt sure I was holding a future classic. The best thing about Claire Arbogast, besides her wonderful writing, is her hard-headed sense of intimacy and her stubborn determination to live a life of love—whatever craziness and jury-rigging that might require from the heart.

Barbara Shoup]]>

Claire Arbogast rewrites the stages of grief in this raw, sometimes unsettling, always compelling memoir that takes us backward and forward in time from the moment her intense, complicated husband is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Leave the Dogs at Home challenges the conventional wisdom about love, marriage, loss, survival, and grace in ways that are bound to make you think about your own life.

Aging to Sage-ing Facilitator - Gwen Bottoms

This very personal memoir is a gift of insightful reflection on how weathering difficult situations and transitions can help us grow and transform and blossom again. The vivid imagery and flowing words were a healing balm. Claire Arbogast has had the courage to find her voice, her true being, and share it.

Carrol Krause]]>

Claire Arbogast's deeply moving memoir records with honesty and clarity how she managed to move forward with her life despite the death of her husband. Her story beautifully depicts the aftermath of deep personal loss.

B.J. Hollars

In this stunning debut, Claire Arbogast infuses death with life, giving readers both the gut-punch of grief as well as the warmth of a life well lived. Candid, powerful, and unrelenting, Arbogast's pain becomes our pain, and her love becomes our love.

Jesse Lee Kercheval]]>

Leave the Dogs at Home is a memoir for and about adults and their very real lives. Claire and Jim take nearly a lifetime to move into marriage only to discover Jim has terminal cancer. But this is not so much a book about grief as it is about love. Readers will share that love and arrive at the end both stronger and wiser.

Editorial Reviews

"Arbogast delivers a raw and honest narrative of her life as a lover, a widow, and a woman. . .The theme of death and life, both literally and figuratively, are navigated with such emotion, it seems natural to empathize with the author in sadness, joy, love, and uncertainty as her longtime companion (later husband) Jim combats cancer. . . An excellent choice for those touched by grief, ready for a change, or just wanting to read a beautifully written memoir."—Library Journal

"A genre-busting memoir of grief and survival . . . Arbogast's rugged, honest account is as fresh, inspiring, and unconventional as she clearly is."—Bloom Magazine

"Life, just as a garden, does not have to be perfect and neat to be complete. Leave the Dogs at Home serves as a prime example of how a humble experience in the outdoors can come to our aid in times of need and healing."—Bruce W. Bytnar, Managing Director, Boxerwood Nature Center and Woodland Garden

"In this stunning debut, Claire Arbogast infuses death with life, giving readers both the gut-punch of grief as well as the warmth of a life well lived. Candid, powerful, and unrelenting, Arbogast's pain becomes our pain, and her love becomes our love."—B.J. Hollars, author of This Is Only a Test

"Leave the Dogs at Home mines the messy, graceful territory of life lived in the midst of upheaval; the roughness and tenderness of it all.  Sharp and engaging, this beautiful memoir invites us to think about resilience and reconnection with the strongest parts of Self."—Beth Lodge-Rigal, Creative Director, Women Writing for (a) Change of Bloomington, IN

"This very personal memoir is a gift of insightful reflection on how weathering difficult situations and transitions can help us grow and transform and blossom again. The vivid imagery and flowing words were a healing balm. Claire Arbogast has had the courage to find her voice, her true being, and share it."—Gwen Bottoms, Aging to Sage-ing Facilitator

"Claire Arbogast's deeply moving memoir records with honesty and clarity how she managed to move forward with her life despite the death of her husband. Her story beautifully depicts the aftermath of deep personal loss."—Carrol Krause, author of Showers Brothers Furniture Company: The Shared Fortunes of a Family, a City, and a Univers

"By the time I finished reading Leave the Dogs at Home, I felt sure I was holding a future classic. The best thing about Claire Arbogast, besides her wonderful writing, is her hard-headed sense of intimacy and her stubborn determination to live a life of love—whatever craziness and jury-rigging that might require from the heart."—Bob Shacochis, author of The Woman Who Lost Her Soul

"Leave the Dogs at Home is a memoir for and about adults and their very real lives. Claire and Jim take nearly a lifetime to move into marriage only to discover Jim has terminal cancer. But this is not so much a book about grief as it is about love. Readers will share that love and arrive at the end both stronger and wiser."—Jesse Lee Kercheval, author of Space: A Memoir and My Life as a Silent Movie

"Claire Arbogast rewrites the stages of grief in this raw, sometimes unsettling, always compelling memoir that takes us backward and forward in time from the moment her intense, complicated husband is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Leave the Dogs at Home challenges the conventional wisdom about love, marriage, loss, survival, and grace in ways that are bound to make you think about your own life."—Barbara Shoup, author of Looking for Jack Kerouac

From the Publisher

A genre-busting memoir of grief and survival . . . Arbogast's rugged, honest account is as fresh, inspiring, and unconventional as she clearly is.

Bloom Magazine

2015-04-22
A debut memoir about death, grief, rebirth, and gardening. Like the real world, the beginning of the book and Arbogast's descriptions of her husband Jim's impending death are tough going. As she reflects on their 27-year, on-again, off-again relationship, she paints a picture of two people who were unable to commit. When they married, they insisted that it "meant absolutely nothing." Neither wanted a real relationship. The marriage was just for insurance purposes, and he didn't want her to tell anyone about it. Though they married in early spring, Jim didn't move into their house until winter. They had bought the house together a few years earlier, two acres out in the country with two big dogs. But Jim didn't always share with her—not the information about his lymphoma or his skin cancer years earlier. He also waited months before telling her about his lung cancer, a result of his exposure to toxic chemicals during the Vietnam War. They went through lung surgery, brain surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, and all the other possible treatments, but Jim eventually succumbed to the cancer. Arbogast's story of rebuilding, or perhaps starting, a life has a persistent thread: her gardens. While dealing with her grief, she tore out gardens, added new ones, and changed entire landscapes, all the while thinking about moving to town. A few trips with and without the dogs, finding her roots, dating, and a new business dogged her search for a new direction in life. She was able to move on when she realized that her relationship was not necessarily as amazing as she once believed. An average memoir that's not really a guide to grief; it's for anyone searching for what will make him or her happy—and more importantly, what will not.

Kirkus Reviews