Nash: Writing the last chapter — Do you have the will to leave a legacy and not a mess?

MY MOTHER’S THIRD husband died without a will. He had done nothing to prepare for his own demise at the youthful age of 49 except to hasten it by foregoing real meals in favor of more olives in his martinis. He had also run through most of his assets but somehow died without cashing a check for $20,000.

Which is how I found myself in probate court on a baking hot day in Indio, a desert town in Southern California, asking the judge to allow my mother to cash the check.