 It's a final question. I know this is a tough one, but someone comes up to you and says, I so much admire your work. I would love to write obituaries for a living. I know there are not many paths into this, but what advice would you give them? I would say don't feel you can or should specialize. The child has not been born who comes home from first grade clutching a theme that says when I grow up I want to be an obituary writer, be a journalist first, go to journalism school. That's what I did when I was 30. I chucked my unfulfilling jobs in book and magazine publishing and went to Columbia Journalism School, got a master's and have been in newspapers ever since. So go to journalism school, be a journalist, writing obits, and here we've come nicely full circle. Writing obits is just one way of doing journalism a very satisfying narrative way.