A Short Life Well Lived

TITLE: Not Fade Away
AUTHORS: Peter Barton and Laurence Shames
PUBLISHER: Rodale
224 Pages
$33.95 CAD

THE BIG IDEA

A Big Media executive who contracts cancer in his early 50’s for a second time recounts his incredibly varied and full life and explores the process of dying with a terminal illness.

WHAT YOU CAN USE RIGHT NOW

“There’s fear at every one of life’s big transitions. Fear goes with the territory. And I see that as an opportunity. Fear makes us study ourselves, force us to admit our soft spots, to see where we are vulnerable. In the end, we can’t undo that vulnerability; we can only accept it, and crawl forward in the face of it. That, I’ve had to learn, is part of being human.”

WHAT WE THOUGHT

Describing Not Fade Away is like describing one of the author’s favourite bands, The Rolling Stones. They aren’t the greatest technical musicians in the world but they are nobody else but themselves and that’s what makes them so compelling. Not Fade Away is the memoir of Peter Barton, a Big Media executive who contracted cancer for a second time in his early 50’s and died shortly after. However, Peter’s story is about much more than his illness. He lived an incredibly full life whether it was playing with the opening band for James Brown at the Apollo, running political campaigns, getting an MBA from Harvard, being a ski bum in Aspen, or helping start a billion dollar company Peter embraced the challenges and rewards of life like few do.

The book essentially goes forward and backward at the same time. Co-authored with writer Laurence Shames, who provides an outside perspective of his journey towards death, Peter looks back on his life and looks forward to the process of dying. Since Peter’s father and grandfather died when they were in their early forties he realized that men in his family didn’t live that long. Therefore, he had to pack as much as possible into his forty-odd years of living. A great example of this attitude is when he was a few credits shy of a Masters in International Relations. Peter realized he didn’t want to go down the well trodden International Relations path and work for the World Bank or IMF for the rest of his life. Not heeding his mother’s advice he quit school, bought a panel van and became a ski bum. He describes it as an incredible growth experience where he learned to have fun with no money and live completely in the moment. Not Fade Away is filled with a lot of great insights into business and life but in this instance there is a lesson that sticks with me. Peter realized that you always need recognize that difference between a dumb risk and a smart one and understanding when you need to change direction and having the guts to do it. He advises that, “So many of the big decisions that define a life- whether in business, or in starting a family or even facing a terminal disease – come down to managing these two ideas.” Because of the position he is writing from Peter can talk about the doubts, fears, triumphs, and true joys of his life in a very candid way. It is refreshing to have someone who was incredibly successful in life admit that they had to suck up tons of fear at every turn to do what they did.

Not Fade Away is also about Peter’s journey towards death. Peter isn’t a religious man, but he is spiritual (even if he says he isn’t). You can tell his love for family, friends, and life in general is intense and that he lived without reserve. If the book suffers from one thing though, it is that the momentum built up by Peter talking about his life occasionally halts when he talks about his struggle with cancer. I believe this has more to do with you wanting to hear more about his life and all the incredible things he has done than his dying. For me, Peter chronicling his death was one of the most powerful things about the book. He didn’t arrive easily or quickly to being at peace with the world but he was incredibly curious about where he was going. That unto itself is an amazingly courageous thing. In chronicling his life and death Peter Barton and Laurence Shames provide a sincere inspiration to anyone facing the challenges life throws our way, and that is why it has earned a place on our blog.

The B Cubed Crew