Rewriting the Obituary

Sometimes I forward obituaries to my daughters with a note that says something like, "here's a good one" which means "which ever one of you writes mine, put some thought into it." I have an aunt who has chosen her photos for the funeral home celebration of life PowerPoint slide show because she doesn't trust the ones who remain to select the most flattering ones. This is something like that. I once suggested that instead of gifts for Christmas, we write obituaries for each other, because truthfully, I wanted to proof mine. My proposal was soundly defeated, and I remain at the mercy of those who I must trust to be clever, witty, and able to present my quirks in a pleasing light.

Perhaps because of my written tribute to a life-well-lived fixation, I was asked to write the obituaries for the two most momentous passings of my life -- my mother and my mother-in-law. In both instances, I had one day to complete it, and it was a sad, sad day of mourning, too. That's my excuse making one huge error in both of them. I have been rewriting their obituaries in my mind for years now. Maybe if I write them down here, the lapse will stop taunting me. It's like my wedding gift thank you note list that contains about 872 gifts and 871 thank you note records. Someone mailed me a warming tray as a gift but no name was included in the package. Obviously, this was before online shopping records, so I called everyone I knew but could never find the giver so that I could thank her. Thirty-five years later I still cringe that I never fully completed the thank you note imperative that every Southern girl is taught is one of the premier measures of refinement.

So here goes....

In Mom's obituary, I said, "Her favorite vacations were with family no matter what the location."

That's not true. She liked family vacations, but they were nowhere near her favorite. The trips she loved were the ones that she took with her church friends. Even worse, I forgot to mention her church membership at all. So here's the replacement.

"She loved to travel with her First Baptist friends from Jacksonville and Pleasant Grove."

For my Mother-in-law, I omitted a child in the family list. She was widowed with five children when she married James Case who had a daughter.  Together they had one child. So that's seven. I omitted the step-daughter altogether and I feel awful about it. She and Mrs. Case had a loving relationship, and also shared a due date. That's right. James Case had a child and a grandchild due on the same day. The grandchild was born first, so James and Hazel's child was born an uncle. Ok, here's the replacement.

"Hazel Case was preceded in death by (parents, first husband, second husband) and stepdaughter, Gail Case Warren."

I feel a little better about this now, and if I could just figure out who to thank for that warming tray, I could move on with my life.