The joke I always tell is that my parents were happily married for more than 50 years, just not to each other. If anything, they found much comfort and stability in their second marriages, which each lasted more than a quarter-century.
By the time my father’s second wife Pam predeceased him in late June, terminal cancer had ravaged her. They insisted on risking coronavirus for Pam’s final in-person medical consult, where the doctor told her he could do no more, and suggested a DNR (do not resuscitate) to prevent extraordinary measures to extend her suffering. My father opted to sign one at the same time.
Pam was expected to outlive my father — after all, she was 29 years younger than him. She volunteered at Ground Zero after 9/11, doing outreach and public relations for meal services for first responders. Within a few years, the cancers began to proliferate. There was no celebration when Pam became a litigant in the Zadroga Act and received a payout. By that point, her life was being measured in weeks.
My father and Pam lived in a cocoon that was deceptively fragile. Into his 80s, my father continued to commute to his office downtown. He’d segued from CEO to Chairman of the Board but remained engaged in many aspects of the business. He began to have diabetic episodes at work, facilitating the installation of a small refrigerator for…
