I understand completely, and even more now that I’ve thought it through, why Biden had trouble coming up with the year of his son’s death.

My son (the little guy on the right) died in 1991. I can say that definitively now because my husband just reminded me. Then he told me he remembers it by adding Maury’s age at death (almost 7) to his year of birth (1984). So he doesn’t really remember the year either. And that lack of memory has been true for both of us for at least 20 or more years.

And yet I remember without hesitation that my older daughter (the funny one on the left) died in 1999. It’s not because it’s more recent. Her death was not recent at all — it was 25 years ago.

So I tried to figure out why the year of my son’s death gets lost but not the year of my daughter’s death.

And then suddenly I put it together with President Biden’s issue about the year also — both my son and Biden’s son were sick for a number of years before their death. My son had a totally debilitating stroke in 1986 (no trouble remembering that year) and suffered from massive disabilities until his death 4+ years later. I remember the exact date of his stroke (though I have no memory of driving to the hospital). But the year of his death just melds into the awfulness that started on Nov 26 (the day before Thanksgiving), 1986 and ended with his death. His death was far less meaningful and not at all as shocking as his stroke and subsequent illnesses, miseries and decline.

Whereas my daughter was just fine until she was killed in a car accident on January 18 (MLK day), 1999. The day stands out as the most awful day of our lives except for the day our son had his stroke. Those are the 2 dates I remember exactly.

Beau Biden was first diagnosed with a chronic and serious illness (not his brain tumor) in 2001. Then in 2010, he was hospitalized for what was said to be a mild stroke. And then in 2013, he got the diagnosis of brain cancer. He died almost 2 years later. Each of those serious illness events takes a toll on everyone who loved him, and the combination of those events and the subsequent illnesses over time blurs the lines between the years.

I would bet that President Biden can easily remember the year (and likely the exact date) of his first wife’s car accident that killed her, their daughter, and put both his sons in the hospital. That was a shocking event. But the year that Beau actually died? It’s so much harder to keep that straight given the awful illness scares over a 14-year stretch.

(BTW, I heard that one of the gratuitous insults in Hur’s report was that Biden said something like “2013 — was I Vice President then — yes.” That was the year of Beau’s fatal diagnosis….)

p.s. BTW, hard as our tragedies have been and much as we miss our Maury and Celia, we are lucky to have two wonderful adult children and a good life.

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