Guide To Google Drive
The Spreadsheet You’ll Need When Someone You Love Dies
Managing the logistics of death can also be a way to heal
This piece is part of How Google Drive Can Make Every Corner of Your Life Easier
I’m a spreadsheety kind of person by nature. The tidy progression of columns and rows is comforting to me. Maybe that’s why a spreadsheet was one of the first things I made after my mother died.
My sister and I faced the difficult task of figuring out what to do with our mother’s beautiful house. My mother, who worked hard for every dollar she ever spent, had collected a perfectly gorgeous and bewildering array of framed art, pretty objects, handsome furniture, and lovely clothes. Her sense of humor, her sense of style, and her sense of how to live well were all expressed by her things. Neither of us could imagine loading them into a Goodwill truck.
We weren’t the only people grieving her loss — my mother had friends and colleagues and family members spread across the country. So instead of giving all of her things to charity, or hiring an estate liquidation company, my sister and I decided to try to rehome as many of her things as we could, finding the people who knew the stories behind this scarf, that lacquer tray, that blown glass…
