Et Tu, Michael? Hearts and Head-stones. . .

Be careful whom you marry: they might get to pick your gravestone.

As Janette at Common Sense Runs Wild and Jody at Steal the Bandwagon have noted, Terri Schiavo’s grave marker, is All About Michael.

And an inscription lesson for us all. Sadly, Terri was not the first to be slighted by a surviving spouse. Remember Fred Astaire? Oh, yeah, him, the husband of What’s-Her-Name:

The Wall Street Journal reminded us of selfish spouses in Having a Say in Your Epitaph:

He was the world’s best-known dancer and a legendary film star. But if you visit Fred Astaire’s gravesite in Chatsworth, Calif., you’re reminded only of this: He had a widow.

He married his second wife, Robyn, in 1980, when he was 81 years old and she was 35. After he died in 1987, she wrote the 11 words on his grave marker: “Fred Astaire. I will always love you my darling. Thank you.”

There’s a lesson here. If you want your tombstone to be about you, you’d better speak up. Otherwise, whoever is in charge of picking out your marker might decide to chisel something along the lines of: “Enough about him. Let me tell you about me.”

And so we see the same nonsense from Michael “I Kept my Promise” Schiavo (Which promise was that? The one about being faithful Till Death Do Us Part?):

With apologies to Shakespeare’s Julius Ceasar:

I come to bury Terri,

Not to praise her.

The evil that I do lives after her;

The good is interred with her bones…

When love begins to sicken and decay,

It useth an enforcèd ceremony.

By heaven, I had rather have coins,

And drop her blood for drachmas…

Pick your mate with care. They just might get the last word.

See also Tammy at A Mom and Her Blog.

A salute to Mudville Gazette who understand duty and honor at Open Post.

Thank you to Outside The Beltway giving voice to others on Beltway Traffic Jam.

ProLifeBlogs gets it right in the debate in Bobby Schindler Responds

More Shakespeare’s Sister speaking out on BlogWhoring.