I was cruising around CNN.com today looking for a juicy topic and instead discovered some very profound advice in the financial section. Now this alone is
unusual considering the only time I ever even glance at the financial section is if I need something to smack a wayward spider skittering across the table.
But this really caught my eye.
The article read, "It's never too late to make a will."
My eyebrows scrunched at this decidedly silly headline.
Of course it can be too late to make a will. I mean, death alone is a pretty good example. Kind of hard to even say much less write, "I (state your name) being
of sound mind and body."
But I read the article and have found that lawyers, under any given circumstance, will give 110% of their effort to scare the living Hell out of you. They do this
so you will scrawl down your worldly possessions to make sure they get to the proper loved ones in the event of your shuffling the mortal coil.
I got to thinking, I don't have a will.
They give a statistic that says over 40% of American's don't have one either. I figured what the hell, I'll write one out.
I discovered that I have a lot of useless crap.
This led me to a very important discovery. If everyone made out a will and scratched out all the useless crap we could donate all that stuff to charity and the
world would be a better place. Yeah, I know it's a little highbrow but give me a break we're talking death here. Consider it a spring-cleaning of mortal
possessions.
But then my selfishness kicked in. This emotion usually rears its ugly head just about the time I do anything good for someone else. It tells me, "what the hell are
you doing? You've been saving that crap for years and now you're just going to give it away to some bum?"
I try to realize with my conscience. I tell it I may die and want to leave a legacy for those left behind. It rebuts with, "what the hell would anyone want with a
broken radio, dusty chess set and a dozen Dungeons and Dragons books?"
It's here I start to get the feeling my conscience is a little agitated. I could tell because it became philosophical. "What if the Egyptians were right?" it asked. I
opened my mouth in response but shut it again.
That was a good question. Could you imagine getting to Heaven and learning that there is a giant U-Stor company up there with infinite storage space? I'd be
pissed. And then some smelly Egyptian strolls by with all his worldly possessions being toted behind him by a hundred stupid Americans.
This, categorically, would suck.
If you don't like the Egyptian thought what about the Buddhists? They keep everything for you until you return. And better yet, they actively seek you out in
your next life. Imagine that. Being born and then you get a bunch of cool stuff "left" to you from some old, wrinkled, Asian dude. Cool!
I turned off the computer and walked away. I decided that a will probably isn't for me anyway. The article said if you don't have one then all the stuff gets
divided by some formula. No problem with me. I can let the state figure out who gets the Debbie Gibson CDs from '87. What the hell was I thinking?