Amy Botula

My project is a nonfiction manuscript, tentatively entitled Other Words for Grief, Midlife: 2018-2023, a reimagining of the traditional coming-of-age story, beginning as the protagonist is about to turn 50. Instead of journeying to find one’s place in the world, the protagonist is at an age where she needs to find a way to live at the intersection of love and grief, where the exhilaration of a new relationship—the kind of love she has wanted all her life—can coexist with burying longtime friends and caring for ailing parents while reconciling the loss of what love at a younger age usually brings, like healthier bodies, more time together, and having children. At its core, my project reinterprets Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’ five stages of grief to investigate addiction, family systems, and women’s bodies through brief, intimate prose pieces. In place of Kübler-Ross’ stages of denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance, Other Words for Grief, Midlife: 2018-2023 is organized into five sections—one for each year—representing a new way to understand the necessary relationship between grief and love. Each section of the project is a year: DESIRE 2018-2019, SURRENDER 2019-2020, NEGOTIATION 2020-2021, VIGILANCE 2021-2022, and LOVE 2022-2023.