It's unsettling and a little scary when well known figures experience untimely passing within hours of each other.  We have longer life expectancy to the point that new mortality tabels have been created so it's especially sad when this happens.

The beauty icon, Farrah Fawcett left us more than we expected. There was a time when every woman wanted to look like her and every man wanted a date. She courageously made her very sad battle with cancer public and lost the fight at just 62.  Her legacy is more than her role in our history as an actress and a pin-up. She chose to add to her legacy by deciding to document her struggle to beat cancer, which made it so clear that this terrible disease can strike anyone - even someone as gorgeous and privileged as a Charlie's Angel.  Who knows what philanthropy will result from her estate, but she made her mark on our lives and then added a final statement that was her final wish to make to us.

Michael Jackson died at 50. He defies description: uniquely talented musician, singer, dancer, choreographer, song writer; accused pedophile; father; brother, son, philanthropist, and very weird.  His description is not important because there probably isn't a person in the entire world who doesn't know who he was. While his life was often clouded with controversy, his talent and body of work is his gift to the world, and his true legacy. We can still watch him and listen or dance to his music and knowing this makes me feel better. Who can believe he's really gone, and at only 50.

It's painful to lose these people so young, their lives created their legacies, which touch us all.  But for most people, legacy takes more than just living our lives - it takes planned giving.  And, this very visible early loss of life should make it clear as day to planned giving professionals that it's never too early to talk about planned giving. Farah Fawcett may have had time to tie up any loose ends in her estate planning. But if Michael Jackson had any second thoughts about the arrangements he made, it really doesn't matter now.  As a planned giving professional, I can't help wanting to see his estate plan.  He was so complex, his life so complicated, that I wonder what his attorneys had to work out for him to meet his wishes, and I hope they did it right.   

We all have a chance to create a legacy. Through our wills and other planned gifts we can touch the lives of others and possibly contribute to a better world. For those of us who help donors create legacies through charity, we should take heart when we think of Farrah or Michael, and not be shy to ask for a planned gift from someone who should have decades to go...at least according to the new mortality tables.