Opining on Obituaries

Two or three times a month I flip through the obituary section of the Sunday paper.  Especially now that they have moved it into the "Faith" section.

Why do I look?  Many reasons:
- I'm writing a book inspired by a man who is in his late 70s or early 80s.  I hope to finish the book before he dies but I'm not in regular contact with him so mainly I check to see if he's still alive
- I'm vaguely curious about people I used to know in other versions of my life
- It seems like good practice not to assume nobody I know would be in there
- Occasionally I see a relative of someone I know and can offer the appropriate condolences
- My grandmother used to joke that she read them to make sure she wasn't in there
- I have been called on to write several obituaries so maybe I'm keeping up with trends

So one Sunday as I was flipping through I thought to myself - maybe I should start writing my own obituary and leave it where my family can find it.  When I wrote my mom's obituary it was much harder than I thought it would be and I got some things wrong.  Things I never thought to ask her or confirm.  I'd heard bits and pieces of her early life but trying to string it all together in a chronological coherent fashion was a challenge.  If I could take that frustration from the family I leave behind - why not.

Then I turned the page and saw a man who had done just that.  It was a large spread.  I had not heard of the man but apparently he achieved some success in his field (something related to oil).  He did not write it to be pompous but because he wanted to encourage others in how to live well.

Sadly though, what I took from it was that as successful as this man supposedly was - he wrote a crap obituary.  It alternated between an "I went to this school" first person to speaking about himself in the third person.  It was probably 20 or 30 paragraphs and every couple of paragraphs switched back to the other voice.

So that's definitely one thing to keep in mind if I write my own - edit well.  If I don't, I imagine my daughter would write it.  She has a knack for writing too so I'm sure it will be in good hands.