I'm not sure why, but lately I have found myself studying the obituaries in our local paper. Well, not really studying, but skimming over each one. Sometimes I notice that the deceased person has family members that I know, or perhaps I am acquainted with a pallbearer here and there. Some obituaries are short and to the point. They simply state when the person was born, surviving family members, those who preceded the person in death. They will also list the place of employment, and maybe a few other details of the person's life and where services will be held. Other obituaries are similar in length to a thesis written by a student who's desperately trying to earn a PhD in their chosen field. Those particular obituaries contain every single snippet of the person's life. Usually, this particular account also mentions that the person touched the life of every person they ever met. Generally speaking, it's that type of obit that fails to keep my attention beyond what the dearly departed accomplished while attending a one room schoolhouse in the 1930's. Apparently some folks feel the need to give an overly detailed account of every, single, year of their lives. Me? Well, lets just say that mine will be short, to the point and truthful.
Naturally, it should begin with my birth date, which happens to be June 2, 1990. OK, Maybe that's off by about twenty years, but who's counting. The next sentence will surely explain that on June 3, 1970 I became grouchy. Grouchy? You have to remember that it will most likely be my wife that will be charged with writing my obituary. I can see it now... Mr. Fix was born in Staunton, Virginia on June 2, 1970. The next day he became extremely agitated and grouchy and stayed that way for the rest of his life. One of his most extreme cases of grouchiness came at a local ATM after waiting to use the machine for up to five minutes. He most dutifully approached the sluggish bank customer and explained that if she wanted to refinance her house, that she'd have to go INSIDE the bank to do it.
Mr. Fix's grouchiness knew no boundaries. Kristi, his loving wife of many years was always there to quell the grouchiness. Once, while at a Burger King drive thru, she calmly explained that the customer currently ordering has every right to change their mind and order something else. There would be no sense in flooring the accelerator and pushing the customer and his car through the shrubbery and into the dumpster on the other side of the parking lot. Mr. Fix was indeed a grouch to end all grouches.
Mr. Fix maintained a grouchiness that could be met by only a few worldwide. He even dragged his foul mood into the house of the Lord. When he was requested to pull nursery duty, his foul humor was grew exceedingly worse. "Nope, ain't going to do it!" As always, Kristi stepped in to help diffuse the situation. "Now, why don't you want to work in the nursery? It's noble work...for the Lord," she'd say.
"Then let the Lord change all those poopy diapers! When those kids see me coming they all seem to crap in unison. It ain't happening."
Mr. Fix is survived not only by his wife, but a son, Ryan, and a daughter, Sidney. They know all to well how grouchy their dad was. Ryan once stated that apparently someone had urinated in his father's cornflakes every single day of his life. Sidney, always a very loving child, simply stated, "I loved my dad, but I never understood how me making every doorknob in the house sticky made him so grouchy."
The story of my life will end like this. Mr. Fix served a hitch in the US Air Force where he was grouchy on two different continents. He was the longest tenured college student in the history of the world which caused a profound grouchiness. Many people compared him to John Belushi's character in Animal House. Services will be held as soon as the family can find a funeral home to take him. He was just too darned grouchy. Memorial contributions can be made to Burger King in an effort to raise funds to construct another drive thru lane.
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