Phew." And yet some of the best art is art that does precisely this sort of imagining, refusing to look away from the very human condition of grief.

You can imagine.

You've imagined it from the first moment your child slipped on the handlebars and fell to the ground, and you ran over to make sure he's okay.

You imagined it from the first moment you felt a fever, and, and, and it terrified you, and then you reassured yourself, and you imagined it from the first moment you realized that your parent could die.

I think for many children, it's around the age of, like, four or so, right? The first moment that you realize that y- no- that none of us will survive forever.

We've always imagined it, so when people say, "I can't imagine," and they do all the time, they really are distancing themselves and protecting themselves.

I know that sounds maybe more bitter than I mean to sound, although sometimes [laughs] I'm bitter.

Mm-hmm.

I've had some amazing moments of really feeling her.

A couple months back, I did this loop around my neighborhood, and I was like, "Worley, where are you?" And three-quarters of the way through, these two older women were speaking very excitedly in Spanish next to a tree, and I don't know why.

I stopped them, and I said, "What are you looking at?" And they said, "This bird." It was in Spanish.

And I saw a pigeon or something, and I said, "Okay, this bird?" And they said, "No, no, no, not that bird, this one." And it was this resplendent woodpecker on the tree in front of us.

And they said, "We're so glad you stopped." And I said, "I'm so glad I stopped." And we all, like, grinned in this huge way, and we were so happy.

And I walked away, and I thought, "What just happened? Why did they even talk to me? Why did they show me this?" And then I was like, "Oh," and, and maybe this is insane, but I was like, "Oh, Worley, I think that was you." I mean, that's what I felt, and maybe you can tell me, like, no, but I don't know if it matters what you think, you know? I mean, it does 'cause you're Andrew Cooper [chuckles] But, but in that moment, I thought, "Oh, I feel you here.

Mm.

When it was time for tough conversations about turning points in Orlee's healthcare, including it's time for hospice because there's probably no cure, are those things you wanted to tell Orlee yourself, or did you want like the professionals, the doctors, the nurses, the hospice care people to tell her? Which did you think would be easier for her to digest?

So I'm gonna back up up to before hospice on that one.

When Orlee first presented with a brain tumor in June of 2022, it was after a week of vomiting and terrible headaches, and her oncologist pulled me into the room and was really upset and said, "It's her brain." We had just gotten a scan.

And then she led me back to Orlee's room and she walked away and I said, "Aren't you going to come and tell me with her? Am I telling her alone?" And the doctor came in with me and said, "Orlee, it's your brain." And Orlee said, "So I'm gonna die?" And the doctor said, "You're so mature." And I was shaking.

I would have these sort of physiological responses to really extreme moments where even if I was extremely calm, and I was always really calm for her sake, and in fact very early on she had asked me not to cry in front of her, and so I really didn't for a very long time, but sometimes I couldn't control shaking.

And she was upset with me later that I didn't contradict her, that I didn't say, "No, that's not true.

We're going to be okay." I really didn't know in that moment what to do.

Yeah, everybody's supposed to do it for you.