Chronic Illness

At the beginning of the memoir, Moth is diagnosed with corticobasal degeneration, known as CBD, a rare degenerative brain disease that would destroy his body and draw his mind into confusion and dementia until he met his early death. This memoir discusses what it is like to receive the news that you will die soon, and how it feels as though you are existing within a void, with a death sentence always looming above you. While they are on the walk, they feel as though they are temporarily escaping from death row, and that he is granted the right to appeal. Receiving this news is an extreme shock to both of them, and Ray describes feeling as though she could feel the presence of his ghost in advance, as she worries about a future without him.