Story by Joe Pisani
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about my obituary. Not that I’m worried I’ll need it anytime too soon, but you never know. Here today, gone tomorrow, as Proverbs says.
What do you want people to remember about you when you pass on? Do you want them to know you got a PhD in environmental studies? Do you want them to know you had loving kids and grandkids, even though they didn’t quite live up to your expectations all the time? Do you want them to know about your successes and accomplishments? But what about your failures and disappointments?
Obituaries usually leave out the negative stuff, especially if our family members write them. Let’s at least hope they leave them out. How terrible would it be if you had some DUIs before you got sober? Or failed twice to pass the Bar.
A former colleague who started his career in journalism with me eventually became the obituary editor of the New York Times. That’s a coveted job, for sure. It’s also a job that gets overwhelmed with requests. Everybody whoever received an Employee of the Month plaque, an Oscar, or Community Leader of the Year Award or who was the CEO of Pfizer or the Mayor of Topeka expects their obituary to make the Times, no questions asked.
To my thinking, obituaries that applaud successes are the most boring obituaries of all because they read like Wikipedia entries, with one boring accomplishment after another. They can also make the rest of us think our lives aren’t a success because we did nothing newsworthy or grandiose in the eyes of our meritocratic society.
I’m convinced that Jesus looks at the value of a life a lot differently than the New York Times does.
Some obituaries focus more on what the deceased did for themselves than what they did for others. There’s nothing more tiresome than an obituary that’s an interminable recitation of personal accomplishments because even scoundrels can do newsworthy things, and there are many scoundrels out there. I suspect Chairman Mao and Fidel Castro had excessively long and torturous obituaries in their hometown newspapers.
My colleague Karen Avitabile had the honor of writing an obituary for her aunt who died at 87. Here are some excerpts that I found particularly moving because they spoke to the kind of person she was:
“Carmella “Carmel” Louise Avitabile, 87, a former resident of Elm Street in the Plantsville section of Southington, passed away peacefully on Sat., Aug. 7, 2021. Carmel grew up in an Italian household — for many years, she hosted family in her home to celebrate the Feast of the Seven Fishes, a Christmas Eve Italian tradition which consisted of different seafood dishes.
“When her brother, Joseph, died unexpectedly in 1972, Carmel and her mother became guardians of Joseph’s daughter and four sons. A graduate of Southington High School, she attended The Teachers College of Connecticut at New Britain before moving to California. For a brief time, she joined the Missionary Sisters in Norwood, Mass.
“She retired from Nationwide Insurance Co. in Hamden as an accounting supervisor and worked part time at Sears Roebuck and Co. in Hamden for more than 30 years. After retiring, she received an associate degree in general education from Tunxis Community College in Farmington and tutored many students there.
“Carmel demonstrated her love of God through many ministries she was involved in. She served as a lector, a Eucharistic minister, a parish trustee, a religious education instructor and brought the Eucharist to the homebound….In recognition of her extraordinary volunteer work, Carmel was chosen by St. Thomas Church as one of the recipients of the 2004 St. Joseph Medal of Appreciation from the Archdiocese of Hartford.
“Carmel enjoyed spending time with her friends and often showed her appreciation for them by taking them out to eat, bringing them to see performances at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam and driving them to spend the day at a casino. She was known for her generosity, doing things such as delivering hundreds of pastries to family and friends on the feast day of St. Joseph each March.”
Don’t you wish you knew Carmel? Her obituary would never appear in the New York Times, but what an amazing life she had, and how many thousands of people she touched with her generosity and kindness.
When my father died, a reporter called to ask me about his life. I said he was a recovering alcoholic with 25 years of sobriety. That he served in World War II during the liberation of Paris. That he learned several trades in his life, including carpentry and locksmithing. And that he was known throughout the community for the birdhouse he made … and gave away to complete strangers. Even today, I still see those birdhouses hanging from tree limbs in different neighborhoods.
One of my favorite sayings of Jesus is that the first will be last and the last will be first. You can get a pretty good idea of the people who are going to be in the winner’s circle from reading their obituaries … and very often they are the people least exalted in our society.
Every life has meaning. Every life has purpose. And I suspect that the lives we never consider “great” by the world’s standards are the ulives that are “great” by Jesus’ standards.