This morning, I woke up and read the obituaries.
It’s the advice author Austin Kleon gave in his book Show Your Work!, which I’m currently reading.
Kleon says that reading the obituaries can be like having a near-death experience. He writes, “Reading about people who are dead now and did things with their lives makes me want to get up and do something decent with mine…although I certainly don’t want to taunt [death] or court it or invite it any closer than it needs to be…I do somehow want to remember that it’s coming for me.”
I’ve never had the desire to read the obituaries. I always knew they were out there, but that was the kind of thing that I thought older people did while eating toast and drinking their coffee. Not me.
But this morning, I decided to try it, and I read about some really interesting people.
I read about a high school teacher of 32 years named William Kelsey who was determined not to let the kids he taught “fall through the cracks.” Knowing from personal experience that all students learn differently, he was committed to teaching in a way that was visual, fun, and engaging. He wouldn’t just teach his classes about marine biology from a textbook – he would bring real, live, animals into the classroom and teach about them. When he taught students that didn’t want to go to college, he would work with them to help them find their talents and discover what their calling might be. He found his own calling and passion for marine biology by accident, when that was the only class available for him to take one semester as a graduate student at FSU.
I read about Patrick Stover, a local postmaster for over 35 years and how after he passed away, his daughters decided to retrace his steps and visit the various places around town that carried significance for him. They visited the post office where he worked and the fire station where he volunteered for 30 years. One daughter said that her father’s rule for living life was, “You set an example, and you don’t brag about what you’ve done”. He saved his money and spent it on things that could never be taken away, like education, paying for all three daughters to go to college. And he spent his money on travel – camping in the Rocky Mountains and driving a Volkswagen van across Italy and Switzerland during a family trip – to create lasting memories with the people that he loved. At his service, his daughter thanked him for teaching her about life and about adventure.
I also read about Robert Patterson, Jr., a lawyer and a fifth-generation Floridian who loved to dance at parties and also loved to wear bright-colored yellow, green, and pink jackets at important business meetings. Patterson was once awarded a plaque by former Orange County Mayor Richard Crotty for being “The World’s Nicest Man.” It was only after Patterson’s granddaughter started asking questions about his military past for a school assignment that Patterson shared that he had been awarded a Purple Heart and also given 4 stars of valor for his service in World War II of which he still carried shrapnel in his body from the combat. He didn’t see a need to mention any of this before. What irony that this fun-loving but humble war hero passed away on the 4th of July.
Although I thought it would be a bit weird waking up today to read the obituaries, I learned a lot.
Kleon was right – obituaries aren’t really about death, they’re about life. Reading about how these amazing people lived their lives makes me want to get up and do something decent with mine, too.