Mortuary Confidential

by Todd Harra

  The tales went on and on. Tales about her daughter, family trips, and her career teaching gymnastics with a bum leg at her studio. I laughed along with her, all the while performing my job of taking notes and gathering information for the funeral service.

  Mrs. Smith seemed to delight in throwing out cheesy one-liners about the death profession. such as “You’re the last person to let someone down!” and “I bet people are just dying to get in here!” Then she would give her sharp, biting laugh that ended in a coughing fit from a lifetime of chain smoking, a habit she continued while in my office. My ashtray overflowed with lipstick-printed slim cigarettes.

  While we were making arrangements, she kept saying “There’s something I want to tell you that I can’t remember.” Then she would get sidetracked on her life’s story. By the end of all her stories I had managed to get all the funeral details hammered out.

  Once again she said to me, “There’s something I want to tell you that I can’t remember.”

  “That’s all right,” I told her. “I’ll go over the price agreement with you and if you remember later, you can call me.”

  I discussed all the itemized charges on the price agreement and had gotten to the total when she burst out, “I know what I wanted to tell you!”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  She leaned over the desk and whispered clandestinely to me as if there were other people who might overhear, “She doesn’t have any legs.”

  Without missing a beat I stared back at her and whispered, “Same price.”

  She sat back and laughed so hard tears came to her eyes. She started coughing and slapping her leg and I couldn’t tell where the coughing began and the laughter ended. I waited patiently with a big stupid grin on my face.

  After Mrs. Smith composed herself and I was walking her out of the funeral home, she shook my hand and said soberly, “Thank you, Mr. Joke. You have made this so easy. I was really dreading coming in and doing this even though my daughter—” her voice cracked, “is in a much better place. I haven’t laughed this hard in ages. I really needed it. To be frank with you, I’m dreading moving to Florida. My cousins are all a bunch of stuffed shirts.”

  “Mrs. Smith, if you ever want to laugh just call me and it would be my pleasure.” And I meant it. “As for your family in Florida, maybe they need a little humor in their lives. Something you can certainly offer them.”

  CHAPTER 26

  Hearse of a Different Make

  Contributed by a Eucharistic minister

  Transporting the dead is a big part of my job. In our fragmented society, it’s not at all uncommon for someone to die hundreds of miles from the family plot. How do we get them to where they need to go? In the old days, the railroads were used. But today, if human remains need to be transported, it’s done via hearse if the distance isn’t too great, or more frequently, via airliner. Believe it or not, the last time you boarded a flight to Las Vegas to do some gambling, or California for a romantic weekend in Napa, or Florida to soak up the sunshine, you were more than likely traveling with a dead passenger in the cargo hold. It’s standard fare, although there are less conventional methods.

  I once served a family who wanted to take “Dad” back to his final resting place themselves. And by that I mean in the back of a battered Dodge pickup truck. I really don’t think it was a matter of money, but rather a promise made. What could I do? I honored their request. These folks backed their pickup into the garage. We hefted the twenty-gauge steel casket into the bed, covered it with a quilt, and strapped it into place. I gave them the burial/transport permit and stood in the parking lot waving good-bye as they headed for a family plot in the Black Hills of North Dakota.

  It’s not illegal to do something like that, though most people are uncomfortable transporting a dead loved one propped in the back seat or lying in the bed of a truck. It conjures up images of National Lampoon’s Vacation in my mind, and I’m sure in the minds of most other people. The typical family would prefer to let the funeral home take care of the livery services. But when I loaded “Dad” into that pickup truck and waved good-bye, I didn’t think in a million years a similar saga would unfold in reverse.

  Several years later a family walked through my front door and told me their mother was dead. I offered them my sincerest condolences and ushered the two sons and daughter of the dead woman into my office. I served them coffee and fresh muffins and we sat and talked about the funeral service. I collected as much biographical information about the dead woman as they could remember—information I needed to complete the death certificate and file it with the state. Then I got around to the biggie: where is “Mom”?

  The son offhandedly told me, “Around back.”

  I was caught off guard and replied, “Huh?” With a dim-witted look.

  The son took the last bite of his third muffin and reiterated, “Around back.” Then he added, “In the pickup.”

  I guess I gave them a horrified look because the daughter quickly chimed in, “We brought her here in the truck. Thought we’d save you a trip.”

  “Save me a trip?” I know I was repeating her, but it was all I could think of to say.

  “Well, sure,” the son said, grabbing a fourth muffin. “She died. I picked her up an’ laid her in the back of my pickup an’ came on over here.”

  I hopped up and practically ran outside, the three clients tailing behind me. The pickup was in one of our many parking spaces just like any other car visiting the establishment. I peered inside the truck bed and sure enough, a figure lay there swaddled in white sheets.

  Hello, Mom.

  CHAPTER 27

  Shot-Putted Urn

  Contributed by a muscle car restorer

  My merchandise display room was a very staid and elegant chamber until one woman decided to perform an Olympic event there.

  I’ve worked very hard changing and tweaking things over the years to ensure that the display room isn’t too intimidating to my customers, yet conveys the message that their loved ones are going to get the finest products. I’ve found there’s no good way to display visual reminders of their loved ones’ deaths, but the impact of coming face to face with caskets, urns, and burial vaults can be minimized, and I’ve tried to present my merchandise in the least threatening way possible.

  My display room is an L-shaped area with the urns, models of the burial vaults, and memorial jewelry visible as you first enter, and the casket display once you turn the corner. A bubbling fountain flanked by plush couches and potted plants softens the room, and, of course, I have classical music piped in.

  The day I met the shot-putter, I had an appointment with a woman and her brother. Their father had died and his wish was to be cremated and then have a memorial mass at one of the local Catholic churches—after which, half of him was to be buried in the diocesan cemetery and the other half scattered in the ocean. Their father had been in the Navy during the Second World War, and he wanted to be with his wife (who already was in the cemetery) as well as his mistress, the sea. Fine, that’s the beauty of cremation; many wishes can be fulfilled regarding the remains, while with a traditional burial, the person can only be interred in one place.

  In talking to the mourners in my office, I learned their father had been something of a Renaissance man. Not only had he been a rough-and-tumble sailor, but he had enjoyed building ship models, taught himself to play the piano, and in his later years, took gourmet cooking classes at the local community college. Before we went into the selection room, his daughter told me, “I think we should put Dad in something that will fit his personality: masculine, yet artistic, and blue… for the sea.”

  I had just the thing for her.

  I took the woman and her brother into the display room to a cerulean colored cloisonné urn that sat on a shelf where the two lengths of the L-shaped room come together. I thought it was perfect for what she was describing—masculine, and yet artistic. I picked it up and handed it to the woman.

  She hefted t
he urn, as if to weigh it. “Okay, okay,” as she turned the multi-colored enameled container around in her hands. “May I open it?”

  “Go ahead,” I replied.

  She twisted the lid off, peeked inside, screamed, and hurled the urn down the length of the casket display area with a prowess that would have made a shot-putter at a track meet take notice.

  The urn ricocheted off a sixteen-gauge steel casket at the far end of the room with a loud bing and then partially shattered when it hit the tile floor. A small furry form shot out of the wreckage and disappeared behind a casket. The woman’s brother cringed, and the woman stood there in horror as if she couldn’t believe what she had just done.

  I’m pretty unflappable, so I turned to the woman, and said, “What? Wrong color?”

  She gave a short laugh, as if she didn’t hear me. “Oh my—”

  I cut her off. “Mouse? They tore down that old church next door a month ago and apparently it disturbed their nest. We’ve been having a mouse problem here for a couple of weeks. Somehow, that little guy managed to get into the urn. Weird. I’m really sorry to scare you like that.”

  “It’s not your fault,” she protested.

  “Nice toss though.”

  “Thanks, I mean—”

  “We’ll pay for it,” the brother chimed in.

  “No. No. Don’t worry about it,” I said, waving my hand in a dismissive way. I didn’t want this family going around saying I had a mouse problem. “It’s no big deal. We’ll pick something else out. Something without a surprise hiding in it.”

  “No, no,” the woman said, dazed. “That one was perfect. That was Dad.”

  “You sure?” I asked.

  “I’m sure.”

  I ordered a replacement urn for their father and called the exterminator back. I thought he was going to have a seizure, he was laughing so hard when I replayed what had happened, acting out the motions in the display room and everything. Apparently a mouse in an urn was a first, even for his line of business, and he’s probably seen mice in all sorts of places. He thinks the mouse must have crawled into the urn when the lid was ajar and it closed behind him; he just got lucky we picked it up before he died in there.

  I still have the partially shattered urn sitting on a shelf in my office. When people ask me why it’s there, I tell them about the day I had an Olympic shot-putter in my showroom.

  CHAPTER 28

  Last Wishes

  Contributed by a website designer

  I met Claire Morgan, a woman who had founded a local hospice program, through a friend of mine. Claire was a former nurse who had lost her husband to a terminal illness at a young age. She was left with enough money that she didn’t have to work another day in her life. Instead of taking her money and moving to the Sun Belt as most people would have done, Claire decided to do something to help families going through the same thing she had gone through.

  Relatively speaking, it was a small hospice—ten nurses and just under one hundred patients. Claire wanted to keep it small to maximize patient care and minimize stress on the families of the dying. It worked. Word quickly spread about this wonderful new facility, and Claire had to hire more nurses to keep the same patient/nurse ratio.

  The first time I met Claire Morgan was at a Christmas party our mutual friend was hosting. She had never come before because she and her husband had always gone to his boss’s Christmas Eve party.

  “My husband recently died,” Claire said to me, “and I just can’t stand the thought of going to a cocktail party and doing nothing but accepting half-hearted sympathies from his colleagues. The idea is simply macabre. I just wanted to… come somewhere slightly anonymous and soak up holiday cheer.”

  I agreed. As we talked more, she told me of her plans to form a hospice organization. I encouraged her, telling her what she planned to do would provide an important step in the dying process, and that I, as one of the town’s many funeral directors, saw the importance of hospice work on a daily basis. She thanked me for my kind words and I didn’t see her until the next Christmas party.

  I asked her how her hospice program was coming. She looked surprised that I had remembered, but then told me she had just opened her doors for business the month before. She had named her company Stone Hospice after her late husband, Stone Morgan. I congratulated her and reiterated my previous year’s praises of the work hospices do.

  A couple of weeks later, Claire called my office and asked me if I’d be available to make some arrangements with one of her patients. I told her I’d be delighted. I met with Claire, the patient, and the patient’s daughter. The patient died a few weeks later and I buried him.

  Over the following years I received periodic calls from Claire to make arrangements for her patients. Some would linger. Some would die quickly. And just as she had cared for them when they were dying, I would treat them with the same dignity once they had died.

  Claire and I had been working together a long time when she called me down to her office to make arrangements. It was unusual, since I usually went to the patient’s house for such meetings, but I’ve found in my business nothing is unusual.

  When I arrived I gave her a quick hug. “Where’s the patient?” I asked.

  “Sit down, R.J.,” Claire said. “I have something to tell you.”

  “Oh?”

  “I’m the patient. You’re here to make arrangements for me.”

  “No!” I said. “You?”

  “It’s cancer. Inoperable.”

  “Claire—”

  She held up her hand. I wasn’t sure if it was my imagination, or if her cheeks didn’t look as full as I remembered. “Look, R.J., we both deal with death on a daily basis. It’s not something most people want to do, but it’s something that has to be done. There have to be people like us in society, people who aren’t afraid to look death in the face day in and day out. Sure, I’m angry that I feel like I’ve been cheated out of a full life, but I’m not scared to die.”

  “Radiation and chemo?” I asked.

  “Already tried. Didn’t work. I’ve got three months to live. I want you to handle things when the time comes.”

  Claire told me the details of the funeral she wanted, and she asked me to care for her family as she had seen me care for countless grieving families that had passed through her program. She wanted assorted cheeses and wine offered at her viewing. She wanted a harpist and her favorite Beatles song played during the service. She wanted the pallbearers to wear white gloves and yellow ribbons, and most of all, she wanted two white doves released in the cemetery, one for her and one for Stone.

  When I left, we hugged.

  Claire Morgan died sixty-four days later. She was 58.

  She is the only person I know who had the courage to face death with such grace when her husband died, and then face her own mortality with honesty, poise, and… courage.

  The hospice has since flourished. I think it is a fine legacy to a courageous woman.

  PART IV

  Wakes, Funerals, and Burials

  I was sitting outside a funeral one day when two men pulled pistols and had a good ol’ fashioned shootout before my very eyes. Surprised? I sure as hell was, but as at any social event, anything can happen at a funeral, and usually does. Sometimes the attendees’ tensions boil over as seen in “Wake Combat.” Other times some total, random, external force that has nothing to do with the funeral, can affect it, as in “Duel at High Noon.” Either way, wild stuff can, and does, happen. I hope, though, you’ll never have to attend a funeral as “exciting” as some in this section.

  What exactly is a funeral?

  We’ve all been to them, some of you readers have even arranged them, and they’re never joyous occasions, so why do we even bother having them? A funeral is the ceremonial marking of someone’s death. It’s a rite of passage just like a baptism, wedding, or graduation, all important events. The traditional flow of the American funeral includes a wake (interchangeable with “viewing”), fune
ral service, and then a burial.

  There is still that “traditional” template, but in 21st century America there is no standard. Families today have a lot of choices, sometimes I think too many. With the increase in popularity of cremation, not to mention the burgeoning demand for green burial, the sky is the limit for memorialization and funeralization. Whatever the wishes of the family, the funeral director’s goal is to provide a personalized memorable occasion.

  Unfortunately, there is a common pitfall. Many companies advertise funeral products that boast they will create a memorable service. But in fact, products will not create memories. People do. I think this point will become evident in a story like “A Hug, a Hope.” Don’t get me wrong, products can certainly augment a service, but a certain type of stationery can’t replace the memory of a granddaughter singing a favorite song of her grandmother’s during the service, or an honor guard presenting a flag for one of America’s fallen heroes.

  While having dinner with my parents not too long ago, I told them about my latest book—the one you’re reading now. After hearing its premise, my dad demanded a “for instance.” I told him about “Duel at High Noon.” At the end he said, “How come this is the first time I’m hearing about this!”

  “I was saving it for the book,” I told him. “You’re just going to have to wait and read the rest.”

  So, read on.

  CHAPTER 29

  My Bar Story

  Contributed by a part-time model

  What’s the craziest thing that’s ever happened to you?”