Stephen Policoff, top left, with his family from a past vacation, including, clockwise, his wife Kate, and daughters Jane and Anna. Both Kate and Anna died in the mid-2010s of different diseases.
Courtesy of Stephen Policoff
Stephen Policoff, a New York University professor of writing, has recently released his memoir, “A Ribbon for Your Hair.”
Courtesy of Stephen Policoff
As a longtime teacher of writing at New York University, Stephen Policoff has always relied on that medium to sort out his feelings. “I know some people are incapable of putting their feelings into words,” he said from his home in Greenwich Village, “but writing has been the way I process all that I’ve gone through in my life. The creative act of putting words on paper is a healthy way for me to process my joys and sorrows.”
Policoff, who grew up in the Albany area and graduated from Albany Academy, has recently published his first memoir and fourth book overall, titled “A Ribbon for Your Hair: Loss. More Loss. And How We (Sort of) Went On” (Heliotrope Books). His beautifully written story describes the dual tragedies he faced when his wife died of cancer in 2012 and, only three years later, his 20-year-old daughter Anna died from Niemann-Pick Type C, a rare, genetic progressive disease that can lead to death. Anna was diagnosed when she was only 5 years old.
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“It was difficult to write about Anna. I knew it was necessary and that I needed to do it. I did become quite emotional, but it also allowed me to recall how even though she was quite ill as a young child, children her age accepted her.”
In the book Policoff describes Anna as being fun and always nice even though she suffered many physical problems with walking and her speech. “She was very charismatic and loved music so much. Not once did Anna ever say she didn’t feel good, and she laughed with all her heart. She was always the happiest kid in the world, and she was a gift to all of us. Writing this book brought back the sadness, but it also brought back all the best of Anna.”
When he first began work on this memoir, some people felt he should tell the story in a chronological way and hold off on revealing that his wife would also die. “That was not the book I wanted to write. I felt readers needed to know that I suffered these two deaths, and that I was overwhelmed with sadness. They also needed to know that I had two daughters that needed my care. My youngest daughter, Jane, was healthy, and it was important for me to try and provide as normal a life as possible for her.”
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Through the years, some friends have told him he needed to move on and stop remembering all the tragic events of that time. “I’m incapable of that. I also believe remembering is what we’re supposed to do, even when the memories are so painful. I hope readers come away from this book with the knowledge that sadness and grief does lessen to a certain degree, but it never entirely goes away. This book is also my attempt to memorialize Kate and Anna.”
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The death of his wife, Kate, is still a shock to him. “She had been ill before when we first got married,” he said. “In our 30-year marriage she had been in and out of the hospital on a few occasions, but she was diagnosed in November (2011), went into the hospital in early February and died in March. It was a huge blow to all of us. For the last 14 years I’ve basically left our apartment, with all the furniture and paintings, as it was when she died. Now that I’m retiring from NYU, after 40 years, I’ll be moving to a new apartment so everything will be different.”
While his wife was dying, he was taking care of his daughter Anna, who was losing so much independence at that time, and his great worry was his younger daughter Jane. “Jane has many reasons to not be doing so well, but she’s actually doing great. She has an art-world job. Art has always been her great passion. She’s living uptown with a cousin and a roommate and doing work she loves. I’m so proud of her.”
Listening and playing music was a therapeutic way for Policoff to survive these losses. “Music has always been a gift to me. Along with writing, it’s another way I can process the world. For Anna, it was how she communicated with us. Music bonded the two of us. We would watch music videos. I would play the piano and she would sing. Near the end of her life she was no longer verbal, but she could sing and bounce to the music that was playing.”
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In the book he writes about the happy times they had at their Hudson Valley home in Phoenicia. “It was Kate’s idea to buy the place. It was a great refuge for all of us. We were there almost every weekend, and the girls loved it. I held onto it for a few years after Kate died thinking the girls would enjoy visiting there, but it became very difficult because Anna was wheelchair-bound. There was little access for her. The place was really Kate’s great love where she could garden and cook food on the grill. I eventually sold the place, but a few years ago I had a book signing near there and drove by to look at the place. It brought back many happy memories, but I did feel a bit like a ghost.”
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One of the main themes in this book is how essential it is to keep on even when everything seems to be falling apart. “It’s really the only thing to do. I have in my title that we sort of went on, and that’s true. We never really fully moved on. It was like when something is difficult and you take a deep breath and then keep going. What kept me moving was the knowledge that I had to shepherd Janey on to adulthood. That was my main task.”
At the end of the book, he writes that he often dreams of Anna. “She visits me as an older woman who is healthy and happy. It’s strange because I never imagined her like that. I love her dream visits. I also frequently dream of Kate. She’s always telling me things. I’m not a religious believer, but there is something about these dream visits that seem more than just psychological events.”