When my grandfather passed away more than three years ago, I offered to write his obituary. I'd written two: First came the doting one, the version that I knew local newspapers would publish without issue. And then I wrote the honest one — the version of his life that I knew editors would refuse to run, regardless of how much money I offered them.
My grandfather was a good, honest and hardworking man. That much is true. But he was also the victim of a brutish marriage, the details of which still make me shudder and my heart ache. The challenges he experienced didn't stop at a toxic marriage; several of his children emotionally abused him, and in the hours before his scheduled cremation, one of them drove clear across the country to clean out his bank accounts upon learning of his death.
