Laugh at the devil

mr_ed here.

If you're at a funeral and everyone leaves but you - if you're the guest of honor, so to speak - well, that's a topic for another day.

But any funeral you can walk away from represents a death that becomes part of your story, one that may get woven into your philosophy, one in which you may even find some humor, eventually.   And so about my parents and myself....

We were all born in different places in Colorado.   My parents both died in the Denver area, but neither of them in one of the same counties we were born in.   And in Colorado you can get certified copies of things like birth and death certificates either from the county where they occurred (five different counties, in our case) or from the state.

In settling my mother's estate, I need copies of three of these documents.  Do I get them from three different county offices or all from the state office?   Hmmm.

Nevertheless, I took a look at the website for the City and County of Denver (my birthplace).   I need my birth certificate to prove that I'm entitled to my parents' death certificates.  Denver says:

Eligibility

You may obtain copies of birth and death certificates if you have proof of your relationship:

Self
Father
Mother
Grandparent
Sibling
[etc.]

The state of Colorado has separate eligibility lists for birth and death certificates.   For example:

Birth certificates may issued to:     [that's what it says, honest]

The registrant (person name on certificate)     [ditto]
Current spouse
Ex-spouse
Parent/co-parent
[etc.]

For some reason, though, "The registrant (person name on certificate)" isn't on the eligibility list for death certificates.

So Denver will sell you a copy of your own death certificate, but Colorado won't.   And that concerns me.   If there were a death certificate on file for me, I'd really want to see it!

But that's just how I am.