Given a “due date” by my sister-in-law

Since my wife’s death last December, my sister-in-law has not-so-subtly been pressuring me to write an obituary.

She told me at first that she and her brother were writing one. (Never materialized.)

I told her several times that I was working on it, and explained how difficult it was. She said “you knew her after [the year we were married] but we know her early years. So I said please! Tell me what she was like as a kid/young adult, and we can merge the two documents! Later she admitted it was “too hard.”

A few days ago she emailed me some “rough notes” — a not-so-subtle prod. These notes consisted of facts like “born in 19**” and married [me] in 19**. Like I didn’t know that?! WTF?! Truly insulting and un-subtle.

Today she called and and said perhaps I needed a “due date” for completion of the obituary.

Readers, I went off. I told her she was free to write an obituary if she wished. That she is not my teacher or my boss and cannot give me a deadline. (She denied giving me a deadline and I said “you just suggested a ‘due date!’”)

I reminded her that she promised to provide details of my wife’s early life… I re-iterated that she was welcome to write her own obituary. I told her how insulting her “rough ideas” email had been.

But what I really wanted to say was “Go fuck yourself.”

Thanks for listening, friends.