The media’s recent preoccupation with death and dying and living wills has spurred me to consider my own situation, even though most acquaintances and close friends would say that I am far from death’s door, that I have all my faculties, and that I know what I’m doing. But it’s a good idea to take stock from time to time anyway.
I have the appropriate living will forms in place; my executor knows my wishes; and my trust is up-to-date. Even though my lawyer and I created the relevant documents five years ago, they still represent my final wishes.
Yet there is unfinished business.
For instance, there are the many half-read books populating my office shelves. I count six on my table alone, each wearing a bookmark like a badge and waiting for my return. There are the photos, over one hundred years of them, in various boxes but not really organized. It’s a project I keep telling myself I’ll get to. There is the afghan I’m working on, and the yarn already bought for the next one. And, finally, there are files and files of half-finished stories, poems, two novels, and one memoir on my computer. Thankfully the files are not of the office supply store variety or I would not be able to move about in my office at all.
I started some of these projects years ago, others just last month. And, unlike the disposal of my financial affairs, I’ve made no arrangements for what will become of them when I’m gone. One answer, I suppose, is to buckle down now and finish a book here, a yarn project there. Tidy up, so to speak. But I have a tendency to become interested in new things, and many interests compete for my time. At the very least, I should make a list of my unfinished business, so that my heirs can choose to pick it up where I lay it down. Or not.
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