The letter from Mum

The letter was in the second drawer down, under the costume jewellery, in an envelope with my name on it in her handwriting. I knew it was hers immediately. The way she did the R, with the loop coming back through itself. I sat on the carpet of her bedroom with the envelope in both hands for a long time before I opened it. The carpet was a kind of pinkish-beige that nobody chooses any more, and the dog was downstairs barking at the postman, and I could feel the blood in my fingertips like a small drum.

It was three pages. It started "darling" and it ended "I have always been so proud of you" and in between it said things she had never said out loud, and a few things I wished she had.

What you do with a letter you weren't expecting

There is no protocol. No funeral director gives you a card that says "what to do if you find a letter".

What I did, and what I would now tell anyone in the same position to do:

• Read it once, then put it down. The first reading is for shock. The second reading is for content.
• Do not show it to anyone for at least 48 hours. Not your sibling, not your partner, nobody. The letter is yours and you are not yet sure what it says or how you feel about it.
• Take a photograph of every page. Letters get lost. Phones survive moves. Cloud backups survive phones.
• Read it again on day three. You will notice things you did not notice the first time.
• Decide whether to share it. Some letters are private. Some letters are addressed to the family. Some letters reveal things that other family members deserve to know. Most letters are somewhere in the middle.

Mine was middle. There were three sentences I did not show my sister, because they were specifically about my sister, and because Mum had clearly written them assuming my sister would never read them. There were three sentences about my father that I did show my sister, because they helped both of us understand a 30-year silence. The job of the reader of a parental letter is partly editorial. You are deciding which parts of the dead person's voice should still be allowed to speak.

The conversation the letter wants from you

Letters from parents are almost always doing one of three jobs.

First job: confession. The thing they could not say while alive. The decision they regretted. The truth about a childhood event. These letters are heavy and they often arrive with a kind of pleading tone underneath the surface words.

Second job: blessing. The thing they wanted you to know but could not say in person, because saying loving things in person was not how they had been raised. These letters often start "you may be surprised to read this".

Third job: instruction. The funeral preferences. The financial wishes that fell outside the will. The plea to "look after your brother". These letters are practical and often brief.

Most letters I have heard about are some mixture of two of the three.

The conversation the letter wants from you is not always the conversation the letter says it wants. A confession letter often actually wants to be forgiven, even after death. A blessing letter often wants to be passed on, not hoarded. An instruction letter often wants to be discussed with the people the instructions affect.

Slow down. Map first. Move later. The fork is on the bench, and the letter is going nowhere.

Writing your own version, while you still can

This is the part of the article I want my younger self to read.

If I die without leaving a letter for my children, I will have made a mistake larger than any financial mistake I could make. The estate will be sorted by lawyers. The pension will be sorted by Centrelink. The superannuation will go where the binding nomination says it goes. None of those systems can give my kids the one thing only I can give them, which is my voice, in my words, addressed specifically to them.

The tradition has a name. In the Jewish world it is called an ethical will (tzava'ah), and it goes back about a thousand years. The idea is simple. Alongside the legal will (which disposes of property), you write an ethical will (which disposes of values, lessons, regrets, and love). It is not a legal document. It does not need a witness or a JP. It is a letter, addressed to whoever you address it to, signed by you.

Other traditions have other names for it. Most religions and most cultures have some version. The form is less important than the act.

A simple structure that works:

• One paragraph on what you want them to remember about you. Specific, not generic. The Saturday morning ritual. The way you laughed. The car. The dog.
• One paragraph on what you have learned that you want to pass on. Three things, not thirty. Pick the ones that you actually believe, not the ones that sound good.
• One paragraph naming the people who shaped you, so that your children know whose stories they are inheriting.
• One paragraph of confession. The thing you got wrong. The apology you owe but never made. The truth that should be on the record.
• One paragraph of blessing. The thing you most want for them, in their language, not yours.
• A signature, a date, and a place where they will find it.

You will rewrite it every five years. That is fine. The first version is the important one. The first version is the one that exists if you die in a car crash on the way home tonight. Date the first version and put it where they will find it. Tell one trustworthy person where it is.

What to write if you cannot start

The blank page paralyses most people. A few prompts that have unlocked it for the men I have suggested this to:

• Finish the sentence: "If I never get to tell you anything else, I want you to know that..."
• Describe a memory of them as a child that you have never told them.
• Write down the three pieces of advice your own parents gave you that turned out to be true.
• Write down the one piece of advice your parents gave you that turned out to be wrong.
• Write the apology you have owed somebody for ten years.

Pick one. Write 200 words. Stop. Save the file. Come back next Sunday.

The metaphor I keep coming back to: a letter is a small ROOM that your children can step into long after you are gone, and the room contains exactly what you put in it. If you put nothing in it, the room is empty.

Closing

The letter you find from your parent is partly a gift and partly an invitation. The letter you write for your children is the answer to it. Slow down. Map first. Move later.