It's sad that grandkids show up at the end of obituaries, way

Hear the tender words of Regina Brett, spoken with sorrowful clarity: “It’s sad that grandkids show up at the end of obituaries, way behind the list of workplace achievements, social clubs and survivors. Why last? If you’ve got grandkids, you know they’re first when it comes to the joy in your life.” In this reflection lies both a critique of how society measures life and a reminder of what truly endures when the dust of worldly pursuits has settled: the love we leave in the hearts of our descendants.

The meaning of her words is piercing. Too often, the measure of a life is reduced to career titles, memberships, and external honors. Obituaries, meant to tell the story of a soul, instead often read like a ledger of tasks completed. Yet Brett points to the grandkids—symbols of love, continuity, and future—as the true treasures of life. To place them last in the telling is to place them last in importance, and that is the sadness she names: the inversion of what should matter most.

The ancients understood this truth deeply. The Greeks spoke of kleos, the glory of deeds remembered, but they also honored lineage, the continuity of family as the true immortality. In the Hebrew Scriptures, the blessing of children and grandchildren was considered the highest form of wealth, greater than any possession. The psalmist declares, “Children’s children are a crown to the aged.” In every culture that revered the cycle of life, it was not career achievements but family legacy that crowned the end of days.

History, too, offers examples. Consider Marcus Aurelius, the philosopher-emperor of Rome. His writings in the Meditations reflect not only on the duties of an emperor, but also on the love for his children and his hope that they would carry forward wisdom and virtue. Though remembered for his rule and philosophy, his truest legacy lived not in his office, but in the seeds he planted in his family and students. Regina Brett reminds us that we must re-learn what the ancients already knew: that joy is rooted in the bonds of love, not the monuments of work.

Her words also echo with quiet rebuke to modern society. For in a world that exalts productivity above all, relationships often appear as an afterthought. People strive for recognition, for titles, for honors, yet at the end of life, it is not medals or minutes of meetings that comfort, but the laughter of a child and the embrace of kin. The sadness is not only in the obituary’s order, but in the way lives are lived to fit that order—placing work first and family last.

The lesson, O seeker, is this: reorder your life before it is too late. Do not wait for death’s announcement to place your grandkids or loved ones first; place them there now. Achievements and honors will fade, but the memories you make with family will shine long after your name is spoken for the last time. True immortality is not in plaques or clubs but in the love that continues through generations.

Practical is this counsel: spend time with your children and grandchildren if you have them; if not, with the young ones whose lives you can touch. Tell them your stories, teach them your lessons, but above all, delight in their laughter. And when you build your life story, ensure that your relationships are not hidden at the end but lived at the forefront. For when your obituary is written, let it be said not only what you did, but whom you loved, and how richly.

Thus, Regina Brett’s words ring as both mourning and instruction: “Why last? If you’ve got grandkids, you know they’re first when it comes to the joy in your life.” Let us not wait for death to remind us of this order. Let us live now with family as the crown of our joy, so that when the final story of our life is told, it will be told as it was truly lived: with love shining above all else.