Obituary & Twitter

 Obituaries, I do read them. Often it is the photos that draw in my attention. It is something in the people’s face and how they look in the camera or at the person taking the picture. Sometimes the photos are old. At other times, people place two: One often taken at a wedding many years ago, or at a graduation from university and the other at the advanced age when the person who passed away was still capable to pose.

In my previous posts, I made a statement about how people will remember you. The obituaries I see are only a fraction of the many people who have passed on and whose family members wanted to share aspects of their life with the public.

What they share is important as it is about Values: What was most important to them, who were most important, what gave them meaning and what brought them joy.

Sometimes with humour, sometimes written quite stiffly in words that seem to be reserved for the purpose of an obituary only, and others….they touch me…

This morning I read the obituary of person “who was warm, wonderful  and who loved people, jazz, literature and most of all family”.

Another one that caught my eye was written with humour stressing the many interesting, idiosyncrasies of a person but who is mostly respected for his “integrity, generosity and kindness”.

Ambrosino, a Delaware-based freelance writer states he believes that compassion and kindness are innate parts of human nature, and by practicing these values we deepen our own humanity.

And then…we have Twitter…and many of those who interact on this very popular social networking service, neglect their values, and in turn distort their own humanity. The angry tweets are normalized and by many perceived as free expression of anger…and although there are certain things that should make us angry, we have a choice in how we express ourselves.

I don’t think we will ever read an obituary stating “we fondly remember them for the many hateful, aggressive and revengeful tweets posted on a daily basis.”