The writing makes it look like I'm already dead. But I enjoyed signing my will -- it gave me the hope that someone will be reading something I wrote at least for a short time after my death. I put my most attractive signature on the bottom line, figuring that it would only be seen after I'd shuffled off this mortal coil. I wouldn't want anyone thinking that I didn't have good penmanship when alive.

John and Sara came over to witness our wills. We ate cookies and passed stacks of paper around the table for each person's signature. Susan and I had also drawn up various documents that will allow us to exercise control over each other's fate in the event of a devastating injury or illness, including the responsibility to yank the plug, if justified. How interesting it felt to apply a pen to a piece of paper, and Shazzam! give my girlfriend the ability to hasten my death, if only under certain circumstances.

Here's an actual example:

(l) If I have a Terminal Illness, my death is imminent, and there is no reasonable hope of my recovery, and attempts to cure my condition have been unsuccessful, I direct my life not be extended by life-sustaining procedures, including the administration of nutrition and hydration artificially.

(4) If I have brain damage or some brain disease that cannot be reversed and that makes me unable to recognize people, to speak meaningfully to them, or to live independently, but I have no terminal illness, and there is no reasonable hope of my recovery, and attempts to cure my condition have been unsuccessful, I direct that my life not be extended by life-sustaining procedures, including the administration of nutrition and hydration artificially.

You read down through this long document that details all the horrific things that could happen to you, and then you get to number 7, which just says:

(7) I direct that if at all possible I be allowed to die in my home.

Number 7 made me feel a little sad. All the other items were couched in such an aura of unreality that I was unprepared for a basic request for a little human dignity.

"I don't want to die in my home," Susan said as she passed her copy to John and Sara.

"You want to die in a much nicer home," I said.