What Remains

I was done with the kitchen clean-up, the kids were asleep and Tanveer was working on his school paper. So I decided to plop down on the couch and watch Oprah that I tape religiously on Tivo.

It was a very moving show, atleast for me. Her guest was Carole Radziwill, wife of Anthony Radziwill who also happened to be JFK Jr.’s first cousin. She was born in a middle class family and worked her way up the New York social ladder. She ended up as a news editor with ABC, met Anthony, fell in love and got married into America’s royal family. She later on met Carolyn Bessette, and the two immediately bonded and later became best friends as she said they both sort of felt like outsiders in the Kennedy family. Anyways, long story short, she lost the Kennedys and then three weeks later, lost her husband to cancer. She has written a memoir called `What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love’ which has been published recently. I know this question is going to be asked quite a lot, whether people would have been interested in her book if it weren’t for the Kennedys. Even Oprah asked her the same question. Her answer was she started writing the book about four years later after that dreadful summer to help herself move on. She started writing it for an audience of one – herself. I know a lot of people are going to be sarcastic about her comments. That’s where my two cents come in.

I just lost my father to cancer not so long ago. I could totally relate to what she was saying. It was actually quite shocking to me to see how raw her pain was even after all this time. I grieve my father every day in so many ways. This blog was one of the ways I thought I’d be able to release some of the pent up stress and depression in me. She said she thought people would be interested in this book even if it was someone ordinary, ‘cause it is a story of fate, friendship and love: that happens to every Joe, Mary and Bill (and Zeenat). I am sure there are people out there that try to milk every single second of their fifteen minutes of fame, but in this case I trust her and I am going to order her book from Amazon as soon as I post this blog.