My friend mentioned to me at work today that there were a lot of obituaries in the local paper today. Obituaries are fascinating things aren’t they? I always read them – sometimes before the headlines.
Summing up one’s life in a few paragraphs is a great exercise for the living, but is usually only done for the dead. Information about clubs, education, family members, hobbies and religious affiliations are all crammed into 50 words or less, but often what is not said is even more telling.
My husband has this theory that as the generations pass, your life gets summed up in one sentence by your great-grandchildren. For instance, since he is 6’7”, Steve predicts that his great-grandchildren will say, “He was tall.”
I was fortunate enough to have my great-grandmother with me until I was 40. Her name was Hannah and I wouldn’t know where to start to tell you about how great she was. It would require far more than one sentence. The verse that she used to pray was III John 2 & 4, “Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as they soul prospereth….I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.”
Let me sum her up: Hannah walked in truth.
I wonder what my great-grandchildren will say?
3 comments:
Hannah was a wonderful lady but I have to point out that she is our Grandmother - not great grandmother
Let there be no doubt though - she certainly was GREAT!
Yeah, I guess I should have been clear that she is my children's great-grandmother....our great-grandmother died when I was 13 - dear Clara. "She wore hats." There's her sentence. :)
My former husband's mom just passed yesterday away after suffering thru illnesses for a few years now. I read the obituary, because that was the only way for me to get information to pass along, and I was very sad to see that is was matter of fact, and merely succinct sentence after succinct sentence. None of her personal sunshine came thru.
I can only hope that one day, someone will have the ability to put the great loss of me aside and create an obituary worthy of a chuckle and written in that universal format of NP High School, School of Exaggeration.
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