Details of Life
by Karen S. Wiesner
In
this article, I talk about changing your perspective from the negative to the
positive when writing an obituary for yourself or for a loved one who's still
alive.
Last summer, after we'd
all finally come through the COVID crisis worse for wear but still kicking, my
family went through a heartrending trauma that (thankfully) was resolved over
the course of just a couple days. Even still, once it was finally concluded, none
of us could easily go back to our normal lives without feeling haunted for
months afterward by it. If a situation that harrowing could actually lead to
anything good, if nothing else, it did spur us to get our future financial,
medical, legal, and end-of-life "ducks in a row". Those in my family
who'd played a role in the event realized that the absolute worst time to focus on these crucial things
was literally at the end of our lives.
Over the course of the
next several months, my husband and I and our other close relatives filled out
all kinds of forms that we'd never taken the time to realize, let alone
understand, could be necessary sooner rather than later. These things were
filed with the appropriate agencies and copies were given to everyone relevant.
More than once we wondered, if we'd done these things sooner, would we have had
to go through what we did at all? There is no good answer to such a question.
At the beginning of this
year, our local library gave a program called "What To Do Before You
Die". While we were fairly confident we'd adequately prepared for the
future, we figured it couldn't hurt to make sure. We signed up and convinced
some friends to join us. For this program, the library director had gathered an
interesting pool of local resources: the County Register of Deeds, a local
funeral director, a flag pole and monument business, the local
cemetery caretaker, an estate planning lawyer, and the County Veteran Service
officer.
Although we'd planned
and prepared well, we discovered over the course of the several hours this
seminar took place that there were a few considerations we'd missed, allowing
us to become even more organized for the future. To cap the highly useful
agenda, there were several knowledgeable souls on hand to talk about obituary
writing. Those leading the discussion advised writing your own "death
details" in advance to make the process much easier for those this task
would otherwise fall to once you were gone. I was actually the one who raised
my hand during this and suggested not only doing this for yourself but for
elderly relatives who were still with you. I'd wanted to write this information
down for my parents since I was very sure at that point I would need to ask
them numerous questions in order to find the answers needed to complete the
forms.
This was something I've had on
my checklist to do since the traumatizing incident last summer and the library
program earlier this year but hadn't gotten around to yet because 1) given its
ties to genealogy, it could end up being a tremendous amount of work, and 2)
there's something very uncomfortable, morbid even, about writing an obituary
for yourself let alone one for a loved one who's still alive.
Merely looking up the definition
of obituary in the dictionary gave me pause:
1. a notice of a death, especially in a newspaper, typically including a
brief biography of the deceased person.
Similar words to "obituary" in the dictionary are eulogy (a speech or piece of
writing that praises someone or something highly, typically someone who has
just died), necrology (an
obituary notice, a list of deaths), death
notice, and necrologue
(a published announcement of a death, usually with a short biography of the
dead person).
Alas, I kept this unpleasant task on my to-do list, regardless of how
disconcerting the idea of undertaking it was to me. When it finally came up in
my rotation, I did an internet search with the words "obituary form".
I looked at a few and eventually found something that had most of what I
wanted. After some brainstorming with relatives, we were able to cull the form
contents to what we thought were the best things to include. Once completed,
the blank form was hardly more than a single page long.
Still, I was having trouble getting started for the same reasons as
before. Filling out an obituary form for myself and family members still living
was the height of "not fun". Additionally, I would have to broach the
subject with my parents, and that seemed disturbing as well. "Look what I
have here, Mom and Dad! Your death notices, all ready to publish!" No,
that was even worse than simply doing it on my own and tactfully asking them
questions I needed answers to in order to complete the form. While I was
hemming and hawing about setting a date to do this work, it occurred to me that
maybe I was going about the process all wrong.
The day came for me to sit down and fill out the form. Instead of
labeling each individual's form an "Obituary" or "Death
Details", I called it a "Details of Life" form. My perspective
immediately changed with the revision that made all the difference. Yes, there
was a whole lot of genealogy stuff that did bog me down, though I'd done a lot
of work in that regard in years past. None of it was particularly organized, so
locating and locking down specifics with accurate information was a bit of a
trek. But even that was kind of fun as I learned and re-learned new things
about the family.
Additionally, I found reminiscing about the past a lot of fun. I spent
most of two days getting the new, compelling "Details of Life" filled
in section by section for myself, my husband, and both of my parents. When I
talked to my parents, it wasn't concerning the unpalatable things like
"surviving family members or those who preceded in death" (those
things, including a death date can be added later, when they're needed). We
covered specific details about their lives that I'd either been told in the
past and forgotten because I hadn't written them down before or that I'd
unfathomably just never known about them.
Everything on this form, once completed, was something I would need to
know to fill out a formal death notice and announcement eventually. In the meantime,
it was a concise summary of the details of a life that I cherished and was
profoundly grateful to know and share.
I've included a copy of my Details of Life form below, or you can find a PDF of it here:
Celebrate life today while it's still today.
Details of Life
Name
(full, including maiden and married names, and any nicknames):
All
cities/states lived:
Location:
Approximate
ages/years lived there:
Other
details:
Date of
birth:
Interesting stories of
birth:
Place of birth and
details:
Father (name,
birth/death, cause of death, burial place, vocation, details):
Mother (include maiden
name, birth/death, cause of death, burial place, vocation, details):
How did your parents
meet?
Name of
spouse (include maiden name):
How the person of focus on
this form met his or her spouse:
Marriage
date:
Your age:
How long you knew each other prior to marriage:
Place of marriage
(city/state):
Ceremony information
(church, city hall, etc.):
Wedding details
Wore:
Reception location
Witnesses/Maid of
Honor/Best Man:
Honeymoon date/location:
Names of
children (could include birth/death, vocation):
Education
(name/location of school, year graduated, focus of study, degree received):
Employment
history: (business/locations, position title and description)
Military
service (branch, boot camp location, years of service, places stationed, type(s)
of work done):
Hobbies/interests:
Memory(ies)
growing up and/or memorable one(s) of your life:
Karen Wiesner is an award-winning,
multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.
Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/
and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog
Find out more about her books and see her art
here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor
Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/
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