I don't regularly check the obituaries with the local online newspapers. But, if I'm thinking about an old friend or family member I haven't been in touch with, I will perform a search to see if they are still alive. I heard that my ex-husband from many years ago had passed away, so out of curiosity I looked online and found his obituary. My next door neighbor recently passed away in November, and I looked up his obituary. One of the memorial sites listed had hundreds of pictures uploaded by his wife.
When I got a daily paper (stopped 10 years ago) I'd scan the obits every day. then for a few years I checked on line almost every day. Now, I almost never look at them. If it's someone I know I'll find out on Facebook. When my first wife passed away (2002) we published an obit and had a memorial service at her request. When my second wife passed away (2016) we did an obit in her old home town newspaper, but no service of any kind, again at her request. When I go, what happens is up to my son. He asked what I wanted, and I just said "Surprise me"....
I glance at it occasionally and notice that there are many who are considerably younger than me who have passed...what a waste! BTW...the Obituary Editor has announced he'll be vacationing for a month, so the column will be presented by the SON OF OBITuary editor. Hal
Since I don't do Facebook or other such things, I'll check in with the newspaper, on line, from the town we lived and worked at in Nebraska. Usually, this is the only way to find out about people I worked with or hung out with. Recently read of the passing of my Boy Scout mentor; the person I took over the troop from. An Ordained Minister who always put the boys first. He taught me much about how to let the boys run the Troop. I will miss his wisdom and caring.
I don't regularly read obituaries but I am sometimes interested in the ages at which people die. I often find myself wishing that I were wealthier so that I could do more about my health, yet I so often find very wealthy people in the obituaries who were younger than I am at the age of death, and I'm not just talking about the ones who die of overdoses and other crazy stuff, but cancer, heart disease, and that sort of thing.
I have no desire to read Obits...depressing, and is just another thing that ole people do.... So I do not save twisty tise, pieces of foil ,have toothpicks and folded paper towels all over the house. Do not save plastic bags except for 3 off and on for trash-do not take magazine, or news papers- in fact I do not house many of the items us older people seem to want to save as we age. Told my daughter if i started doing that- shoot me
I am terrible. First I check to see how many died that are my age or close to it. Then I check the obits of all those who wronged me. As of last year, all are now dead. I know that is terrible but they really wronged me and were not good people. It is my way of dancing on their graves. I once had an argument with a boss and he said that I will never have what he has, big house, boat, fancy car, etc.. unless I did things his way. I told her that he will never have what I have. He asked what. I said my youth and I bet that you would trade all those things you listed for the extra 20-30 years I will live after you die. I won. He died 25 years ago.
I discovered that my first husband had died when finding his obituary through an Ancestry.com hint. We had had no contact since he PCS'd back to the States from Germany. And it was through checking obits online that I discovered my birth mother had died 2 months after my only letter from her. We never met. It was also in that obit that I discovered she had had 3 subsequent children, and that I had a sister and two brothers, one that had died on a Thanksgiving weekend in 2001 from a drug overdose.
I've known people who read the obits. One was a neighbor who was younger than I. He had an unhealthy obsession with it, and died in his mid-late 40s. Others are well-entrenched in their small communities, and it's their way of staying on top of things.
No, @John Brunner, she was in Tempe AZ, some 1400 miles from me. In the only letter I ever had from her she had revealed that she had stage 4 cancer, so I started checking obits online for her town.
I don't check obits but there is an "in memoriam" section of the breast cancer forum that makes me sad.
Understood. Seems we all got stories. I wonder what percent of us experience that mythical "normal life" I hear rumors of.