DEATH | WRITING

Family Members Keep Asking Me to Write Their Obituaries

How do you sum up a person’s life in 400 words?

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Throughout the years, family members have asked me to write obituaries when someone dies. I wrote my father’s, my stepfather’s, and this week, I wrote my grandma’s. My cousin, aunt, and grandfather have asked me to write theirs, too. Last night, I wrote my own and left blanks for my husband to fill in later. I want to control the narrative of my life and highlight the important things.

I knew that communications degree my parents paid thousands for would come in handy someday. I’m using the skills I learned in my first journalism class in junior college. Our professor gave us an assignment to write our own obituary, but that didn’t make me an expert. My experience came from editing obituaries for 24 years at the newspaper.

It’s difficult summing up a person’s life in 400 words, especially when that person meant the world to you. For my grandmother’s obituary, I followed the standard format: Name, age, town, time and date of death; place of birth, parents’ names; survivors; those who preceded in death, education; career; service information; and memorials. I also added some personal tidbits to make her more real to the reader. She liked to cook. She enjoyed wine. She…