Val Patterson Obituary: Confessions Of A Dying Man

Obituaries are usually written by a loved one or close friend of the deceased, but in the case of Val Patterson of Utah, it was more of a self-written confession, as he was dying of throat cancer.

The unusual obituary, published in the Salt Lake Tribune, caught the attention of not only family and friends, but total strangers who were touched by the honesty with which Patterson confessed his many “sins”.

Val Patterson died in July, at 59-years of age from throat cancer, but wrote his self-penned obituary the previous fall.

Patterson starts his obituary by talking about his wife of 33-years, Mary Jane, and his love for science which led him to pursue a career in Engineering, however, the Ph.D. from the University of Utah was a clerical error, he didn’t even graduate, much less get a degree.

“I was a true scientists,” Patterson wrote in the obit. “As it turns out, I AM the guy who stole the safe from the Motor View Drive Inn back in June, 1971. I could have left that unsaid, but I wanted to get it off my chest. Also, I really am NOT a PhD.”

“What happened was that the day I went to pay off my college student loan at the U of U, the girl working there put my receipt into the wrong stack, and two weeks later, a PhD diploma came in the mail. I didn’t even graduate, I only had about 3 years of college credit.”

However, Patterson was very confident in his designs:

“For all of the Electronic Engineers I have worked with, I’m sorry, but you have to admit my designs always worked very well, and were well engineered, and I always made you laugh at work.”

Patterson confessed to filling a “really mean Park Ranger’s” geyser with rocks, effectively ruining it and apparently he did something so wrong at Disneyland and Sea World in San Diego, that they “banned him for life,” something the parks don’t have to worry about any longer.

The obituary closes on a more serious note, when Val Patterson talks about how sorry he is for taking up smoking, when he was young and knew how bad it was for him.

“Now, to make it worse, I have robbed my beloved Mary Jane of a decade or more of the two of us growing old together and laughing at all the thousands of simple things that we have come to enjoy and fill our lives with such happy words and moments. My pain is enormous, but it pales in comparison to watching my wife feel my pain as she lovingly cares for and comforts me. I feel such the ‘thief’ now – for stealing so much from her – there is no pill I can take to erase that pain.”

Val Patterson’s unusual obituary closes saying his family is following his wishes not to have a funeral or burial, but instead invites those close to him to remember him in their own way and asks them to join in a “celebration of life” instead. He has one last word of advice for those reading his obit, “If you want to live forever, then don’t stop breathing, like I did.”

Could you confess all your faults like Val Patterson did in his obituary?

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