I've always enjoyed...
...working with dying people because after they realize that they don't have much time, wisdom rains on them as though it were coming out with the force of a fireman's hose. Dying people, knownst or unbeknownst to their family, will talk to nurses about things they don't think their family can handle. So, I've gotten to know them well over decades of working with them.
A huge part of the wisdom that gives the dying so much comfort is the part where they realize how pathetically negative some behaviors are. They realize that their time could have been better spent on much more productive endeavors. If it's any consoloation, few of them continue the negativity after the diagnosis is made. They tend to live their last weeks or months as positively as possible.
But...if a person died unexpectedly and in the middle of an excercise in bitterness, they never get the opportunity to experience the ability to live a pleasant life surrounded by their loved ones. And all too often, their bitter behaviors are directed at their loved ones.
Consider this Brooklyn couple who wanted to be sure to leave a nasty will behind when they croaked:
A Brooklyn couple slain in their home last month spoke from the grave in drafted last wills, leaving a bizarre legacy for unloved ones they detested in life.
A few of their last wishes-
"To my brother who I know hopes to be in my will, well, here you are...the sum of zero ($0.00) Dollars....So, Robert, you have a choice, you can come to my grave site to say hello out of love or piss on me for not giving you money."
Schwartz's wife...took an apparent shot at her first husband, James, leaving him no cash but decreeing that a "gift" of $10,000 be made in his name to a battered-women's shelter.
"With regard to my estranged family who were never there for myself or my children, but always there for their distorted version of Catholicism, I give and bequeath the sum of $1 each to my" mother, father, two brothers and sister "and request that they donate same to their precious church to whom they had a greater allegiance, than to their first child and sister."
Schwartz also lays out $25,000 for each of two friends - Steven Rezac and Peter Klages - but cautions them not to tell their spouses. "This gift is conditioned upon each of them not telling their respective wives of said gift so they may not get their hands on same,"
And just in case they didn't offend everyone, they left a few parting jabs at some folks who weren't even on the list to receive a dollar:
"...I curse each one of them as follows," Schwartz wrote. "To Boom Boom, the electricity never be on when you need it; to TR, never will any of your radios work again" "To Bobby, never will your gun shoot when you need it."
That last one was pretty cold, if I needed my gun to shoot, it would be because someone else's gun was pointing at ME!
Anyway, that's how these people chose to be remembered. They weren't lucky enough to have any notice that they were about to die so they had no chance to rethink what they had done. They didn't even have a chance to grow old and develop wisdom the way some others do...through life's experiences.
I must say, I did appreciate the wife's idea of leaving the ex a gift in his name to the Women's Shelter. That is of course, if he really did smack her around. If he didn't, that was just mean. And it's not that I don't appreciate a little mean here and there, but I wouldn't want it to be my legacy.
I would consider the Women's Shelter thing, and I could do it honestly. But I think I'd rather leave it in the form of a scholarship for women whose husbands cheated on them and then left them with no way to handle the bills. There's already a lot of help for battered women, not so much for the hideously betrayed.
Anyway, I read that and thought that it would be interesting to discuss and now that I've done so, I think I'll be off to do something else...productive.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/08262008/news/regionalnews/slain_coulples_weird_will_126221.htm
...working with dying people because after they realize that they don't have much time, wisdom rains on them as though it were coming out with the force of a fireman's hose. Dying people, knownst or unbeknownst to their family, will talk to nurses about things they don't think their family can handle. So, I've gotten to know them well over decades of working with them.
A huge part of the wisdom that gives the dying so much comfort is the part where they realize how pathetically negative some behaviors are. They realize that their time could have been better spent on much more productive endeavors. If it's any consoloation, few of them continue the negativity after the diagnosis is made. They tend to live their last weeks or months as positively as possible.
But...if a person died unexpectedly and in the middle of an excercise in bitterness, they never get the opportunity to experience the ability to live a pleasant life surrounded by their loved ones. And all too often, their bitter behaviors are directed at their loved ones.
Consider this Brooklyn couple who wanted to be sure to leave a nasty will behind when they croaked:
A Brooklyn couple slain in their home last month spoke from the grave in drafted last wills, leaving a bizarre legacy for unloved ones they detested in life.
A few of their last wishes-
"To my brother who I know hopes to be in my will, well, here you are...the sum of zero ($0.00) Dollars....So, Robert, you have a choice, you can come to my grave site to say hello out of love or piss on me for not giving you money."
Schwartz's wife...took an apparent shot at her first husband, James, leaving him no cash but decreeing that a "gift" of $10,000 be made in his name to a battered-women's shelter.
"With regard to my estranged family who were never there for myself or my children, but always there for their distorted version of Catholicism, I give and bequeath the sum of $1 each to my" mother, father, two brothers and sister "and request that they donate same to their precious church to whom they had a greater allegiance, than to their first child and sister."
Schwartz also lays out $25,000 for each of two friends - Steven Rezac and Peter Klages - but cautions them not to tell their spouses. "This gift is conditioned upon each of them not telling their respective wives of said gift so they may not get their hands on same,"
And just in case they didn't offend everyone, they left a few parting jabs at some folks who weren't even on the list to receive a dollar:
"...I curse each one of them as follows," Schwartz wrote. "To Boom Boom, the electricity never be on when you need it; to TR, never will any of your radios work again" "To Bobby, never will your gun shoot when you need it."
That last one was pretty cold, if I needed my gun to shoot, it would be because someone else's gun was pointing at ME!
Anyway, that's how these people chose to be remembered. They weren't lucky enough to have any notice that they were about to die so they had no chance to rethink what they had done. They didn't even have a chance to grow old and develop wisdom the way some others do...through life's experiences.
I must say, I did appreciate the wife's idea of leaving the ex a gift in his name to the Women's Shelter. That is of course, if he really did smack her around. If he didn't, that was just mean. And it's not that I don't appreciate a little mean here and there, but I wouldn't want it to be my legacy.
I would consider the Women's Shelter thing, and I could do it honestly. But I think I'd rather leave it in the form of a scholarship for women whose husbands cheated on them and then left them with no way to handle the bills. There's already a lot of help for battered women, not so much for the hideously betrayed.
Anyway, I read that and thought that it would be interesting to discuss and now that I've done so, I think I'll be off to do something else...productive.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/08262008/news/regionalnews/slain_coulples_weird_will_126221.htm
posted by Meg Kelso | 4:22 AM
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