New friends

So, I am finally feeling a bit better today.  I am tired, mostly tired of coughing, but I finally don't have a headache the size of Alaska.

Wednesday, right? So that means funeral services.

I haven't worked any really fascinating services lately, but I have worked some services that have ended by starting a new friendship or two.

One, a service for a woman in her late 50s (I think), her daughter was the one to make arrangements, along with her grandma (the mother of the deceased), and everything went really well.  So well, in fact, that the daughter invited me (the service was on a Saturday), along with my J and Clem, to meet up with them (she and her hubby, her dad, grandma, some aunts , uncles and a few friends) for breakfast and bloody marys the next morning, so we went.  We had a blast.  They loved Clem, and weren't at all odded out by my having a girlfriend.  It was great.  So great, in fact, that they called a few weeks later when they were back in town (the daughter and her husband) to do it again.  It really was wonderful.  We went to the same Basque place, had an awesome breakfast (served with wine, ???), and they taught Clem how to say she's from the area code that we live in. Hilarious.

I'm not really sure why, but I wanted to share that one with you.  Maybe I needed a little pick-me-up this week.

Glee, party of three

Ha!! I'm not sticking to my own schedule.  Today should be embalming, and I started an embalming post, but I had a quirky work episode.

So, I'm sitting here watching Glee reruns with J, and we have a guest.

A man died.  I am working with his brother, who is in charge of his arrangements, and getting everything together for his cremation.  He had a pre-arrangement, so it makes it a lot easier (do it! it really does make it easier, even if you don't pre-pay), and in his pre-arrangement he stated that I am to go to his home and retrieve his wife's cremated remains and put his remains in the urn with hers.

So, today, after work, before I picked up Clem, I went to the man's home.  I took the urn, put it in the car (buckled) and was on my way.  I got Clem and was home shortly after.  When I got home I took Mrs. Dead Husband out of the car (I couldn't just leave her there overnight, what if it was cold...what if the car got broken into...what if the world ends tonight and she's alone?), took her inside, and sat her on the couch.  I found J in the kitchen, putting away the dishes I had washed last night, and I said hi.  Shortly after she came in the living room.

J: What's this?
me: Oh, thats Mrs. Dead Husband.
J: ???
Me: [I explain]
J: What, you want her to watch tv with us?
Me: Well...
J: Um, can she sit on the floor?
Me: Sure (moving her to the floor).
J: Really? You're putting her there so she can watch tv still?
Me: Uh, yeah (OBVIOUSLY!!!!!)

So, she's here, right with me. And I hope she liked show tunes.

I'm sorry

I don't really know what to say. Thanks for the emails to those of you that wrote to make sure I'm alive.

I am in a funk I guess.  I've been busy at work, lots of co-workers have been vacationing so the few of us that haven't taken off are picking up the slack.

My family relationships (or lack thereof) have been getting to me more than usual.  My sister (the one that watches Clem) asked me not to come to her baby's dedication at church a few weeks back, and while I understand her perspective (she doesn't want me to have any spiritual influence on her daughters), it hurts quite a bit.  We had a good talk that day, I listened to her concerns and didn't argue, and I tried really hard not to cry in front of her, but it didn't work.  I tear up even just typing about it.

My ex has moved away.  For now Clem spends one week with me and one with him and we are switching off like that all summer.  She is with him this week, and I miss her terribly at times. I took her to her dad's on father's day, and drove back home in time to have dinner at my parents' house.  I felt so out-of-place, but I realize it's a position I've put myself in. I had no child, no partner, and I felt like less of a daughter to my dad because I know how hard the whole process of me breaking up with my spouse and then dating someone of the same sex has been on him, and I wonder if I'm ever going to feel like his girl again. I am terrified.

I don't mean to make this a total downer post, I have been having fun, I just feel like I am starting to adjust and sometimes it gets overwhelming.  I'm one of those people that hopes.  I hope a lot.  I expect a lot too. I find myself expecting the things I have hoped, and that's where I find trouble.  I had hopes for my relationship with J in regards to my family. I still do, and I think it's those expectations that tend to get me down. I want them to see what I see, you know? I want them to understand. And I know they aren't the ones to blame, and I try so hard to tell myself that they only want what's best for me, and being with J isn't what they believe is best, but I just feel so alone without them sometimes, and it has been hard.

So, thanks for listening. I promise another post (about sewing mouths shut) soon.

I tried to make it less wordy with the photos

Mother's Day was a bit different this year.

On Saturday I dropped Clem off at her dad's, they were going to take a trip to see his parents for the night and come back Sunday afternoon so I could have her for Mother's Day dinner at my moms. She arrived at my mom's around 3, and to my surprise her dad had bought a card for her to give me. She had written "mommy" (see photo) and even signed her name inside, getting quite good for a three-year-old, if I do say so myself.

She was excited to be at my parent's house, and told everyone "Happy Mother's Day" when they started arriving. My sister's oldest daughter woke up from her nap shortly after Clem got there, and they played outside while my sisters and I cooked dinner. We had decided to make pasta with three different sauces, and mine turned out really well.  It's a sauce that I invented years and years ago, and just to be nice I'll share it with you here.  Keep in mind that I don't like tomatoes, so when I say you'll like this pasta even if you don't like tomatoes, I am telling the truth. Also, I was making enough for a lot of people, so, you might want to cut the recipe in half.  I made two batches of it, as my sisters thought we might need more, and even with just half of the half I was making at a time, it's enough for a few people. Also, I should mention that it is quite garlic-y.

Start with some olive oil in a frying pan, not much, and it needs to be a bit hot.  Add four gloves of garlic, finely minced, and stir until it gets crispy (but not charred). It will start to stick together.

Turn the heat way down and wait a minute before adding about three-quarters cup of a dry white wine (I use pinot grigio because that's the one I always have) and turn the heat back up to simmer the alcohol out of the wine and get the garlic flavor into the liquid.  Keep stirring.

After that has cooked a while I added a half can of stewed tomatoes, finely chopped, along with the juice in the can.  I know, to tomato people it sounds gross to not use fresh ones (which I'm sure can be substituted here), and to non-tomato people it sounds gross because they're (disgusting) tomatoes, but I promise, they're yummy.  Stir and keep cooking for a while (like 5 minutes) and add salt and pepper to taste.

I know, it kind of looks like vomit, but it really is good.  The last thing to do is add a little bit of butter, like a tablespoon, and stir it up really well.  It's a very runny sauce, and it works very well for dipping breadsticks in, and is, by far, my favorite pasta sauce.

So, dinner was very yummy, and dessert was good too, and it was nice to hang out a bit.  Neither of my sisters or I have been talking much lately, since the whole "leaving the hubby for another woman" thing, but yesterday seemed a bit better than it has. Clem was quite a good girl, and my mom asked me if I thought she would want to stay the night at her house last night.  I feel like she used to stay there a lot, and lately she doesn't get to as much, whether it's because she stays with her dad half the time, or that I just like having her at home with me, or some other reason I haven't even thought of, I don't know, but when I asked Clem if she wanted to she was excited and said yes.  As soon as the middle sister heard what was going on I heard her say to my mom (with her voice full of disgust), "On mothers day???" and I immediately wanted to leave.  I mean, I get it that I'm making the wrong choices in her mind. I get it that she thinks only awful mothers would let their daughter stay the night at their grandparents' house on this holiest day of a mother's year. I get it that she wants mom to know she thinks I'm making the wrong choices. But I wish that she could get a few things from my perspective. I wish she knew how it felt to be a single parent when you're married. Does she understand what that's like? To feel like the only one taking care of an infant? To feel like it's a fight to the death to keep sane and breastfeed and change all the diapers and make dinner and clean the house and get thin and bring the baby to see the family, etc. She can't possibly. She's married to Mr. Mom. He does it all. Laundry, diapers, feedings, work, love, time, all of it.  Does she know what it's like to feel like you aren't a priority? Or that you're in the way? Or that you're an embarrassment? How could she? And really, I sound like a bitch and I don't mean to (completely), because I don't want her to know that. I want her to have it the way she does. But I want her to see that it wasn't that way for me. I want her to see that I didn't leave a perfect and happy home.  I didn't leave so that I could be happy, I left so that I could just not me miserable, and stop feeling like I've failed at getting love.  And it's hard for me. And terrifying. And I know that I sound like I am completely ungrateful of my ex and think he did it all wrong, and that's not entirely the truth. He had a good job, and I didn't have to worry about money. I had all of the "things" I wanted, but he was missing what I needed.  I needed help, and I needed attention, and I needed love, and I needed time.

I was thinking last night at the Mother's Day dinner table how I used to want kids.  I wanted a few of them.  I wanted them right away when I married, but we waited. I wasn't one of those people that loves children, but I knew I would love my own, and I wanted them so badly.  Then I had Clem and it all changed. I was depressed. I was tired. I was sad. Every morning until she was five months old and I finally called my aunt to tell her I just wanted to die and she had me go down right then and get on some meds I would think to myself, "this is the end of my life, I won't make it through this" and I knew, kids aren't for me.  I didn't think I'd even make it to see Clem enter kindergarten, let alone ever want to have another one of these things that just take. so. much. work. I was done. The mother I wanted to be for so long was like a fairy tale. I didn't even mourn her loss.

So, now I sit here at my work computer, and I feel like complete crap about my sister and how judged I feel, and I just think, I gave up wanting more children because of the support I didn't receive from my ex, what am I going to have to give up because of my family? I don't know if I think it's hopeless to believe they will ever accept me being with a woman, and I'm trying to not dwell on that, but I just wish I could tell them how hard it is for me. And sometimes I wonder how I am supposed to get through it without them.

I will follow you into the dark

I got a call back in February from a pastor in a town not far from the city I live in asking for prices on a cremation, and asking for some details on how the whole process works. She told me that she was calling on behalf of one of the members of her church whose partner was being put on hospice care, dying of cancer. I gave her prices and some information, and asked her if I could be a bit nosy, and she told me yes, so I asked a bit about the “partnership” and what she meant by that. She told me that the women had been together for years (like 30 or more) and that they (obviously) weren’t married, but that they were each other’s legal next-of-kin, and also gave me cute little details about their relationship. So, I explained that I would need a copy of the documentation of that (which is odd, married couples don’t have to bring in their proof of marriage to show that they are, in fact, the legal next-of-kin), and that I could email all the forms to her to sign and fax back to me, and she said that would be great.

The forms were all sent back to me the next day, and we have kept them on file so that when the woman dies we will have everything we need. I didn’t end up talking with the partner making the arrangements ever, just the pastor, who was very kind.

The woman died yesterday. Big Bird gave me the file so that I could call the partner and touch base with her and make sure that the way everything had been set up back in February was the way it should be. She was very soft spoken, and quite calm, and I immediately liked her. I asked her if she had any questions about anything and she didn’t, and we went over some of the information I had in the file, and a couple of times she got a bit choked up, and I could hear the strain in her voice, trying not to cry.

I felt so badly for her, like I was feeling just a small part of the heartache she was feeling. I never feel like I want to hug people I make arrangements for (well, almost never), and I just wanted to hug her. I wanted to tell her that it’s okay to cry, and that I’m so sorry she lost the woman she has loved for most of her life. But I couldn’t, and she isn’t going to ever meet me, as the cremated remains are being shipped to her when the cremation is complete, and I’m disappointed. So, I wrote her a letter:

Dear *lady*
I want to express my condolences on the loss of your love. I know it might seem insincere to receive a letter like this from a funeral home employee, but I am truly sorry for her death, and I wanted to let you know that you have been in my thoughts today. I cannot begin to imagine the hurt that you are feeling, and I hope that you understand that it is okay to feel that way, and it’s also okay to not try to unfeel it.
It was nice to talk with you over the phone, and I hope that if there is anything you need that I can help you with (grief support groups in your area, counselor recommendations, etc.) you will let me know, it would be an honor for me to do that.
Sincerely,
Doll

I’m a bit nervous to send it though.

It’s funny, here this woman has lost her partner, and I can’t help but think she’s the luckiest woman on earth. How many people die without that kind of love? Far too many, I would guess.

Click here to hear the song this post is titled after.

Mourners, party of 3...

I know I've mentioned before that some people decide to pre-plan their funeral services, and that it insures that their wishes are followed after they die.  Well, we had a death this week for a woman who had done just that, and pre-planned a funeral service in the chapel, followed by burial in a cemetery here.  She picked out everything, and prepaid for it all, so when she died we got started arranging for everything and found out she has no family.  Apparently the state (or county or whatever) appointed a public guardian to her to help take care of her (find a nursing home, figure out medical care, take care of finances, etc.) since her husband died 20 years ago and she had no other family.  Normally in that sort of case the public guardian will just have the remains cremated and then buried somewhere, using any funds that the deceased has left, but in her case it was all taken care of, so the guardian let us take care of it all.

Anyway, we knew no one was going to come to the service. It seems sad to think that, and I suppose it is, but all of us were kind of excited that we would get to be the attendees for the service.  Our very own Buck was the officiate, and Monica, Tank and I sat in the first pew of the chapel.  Boss sat in the back (he was the only one that knew the deceased at all), and Big Bird popped her head in a few times.  The service lasted about 25 minutes, and at the end Buck and Buffy sang Amazing Grace a cappella, and it was beautiful.  We were all given a chance to say a few words about the woman that had died, and although we didn't know her we said what was on out hearts.  It was really a wonderful service, and a great end to my week.

Staring out the window...

I blogged a while back about that guy making his own funeral arrangements because he was dying, remember? Well, he isn’t dead yet. Actually, I’ve wanted to post about him not being dead yet but have thought that I didn’t want to jinx him by doing so (I’m a bit terrified that I am going to come into work tomorrow and he will have died). Anyway, in true me fashion, I’m going to blog about *my* feelings and *my* thoughts about this man, instead of blogging about what his immanent death might be doing to *his* thoughts and feelings, as I don’t know him, nor do I think it would be appropriate to ask him if I did.

The hospital he told me he’d be at is just up the street. I can see it through the window here at my desk. It’s the hospital where I was born, and it is the hospital in which many people die, including, at some future date, my pre-arrangement leukemia man. In the post I mentioned wanting to visit him in the hospital, he was supposed to check himself in sometime in early February, and I still want to. I don’t think I want to talk to him, just maybe go poke my head in while he’s asleep, or ask a nurse if there’s anything I can get him that he might need (maybe some delicious French fries, I know that I’d want some if I were stuck, dying in a hospital), just so I can see him alive again. I’m not sure why, but I just don’t want the next time I see him to be when he’s dead. I want to know when his daughter turns 18. What if he doesn’t make it (he didn’t think he would)? What if he does? How will I know? I have instructions to not call her when he dies, a friend of his will tell her, so I don’t have a way of knowing. Why does it bother me so much? Argh. I’m so confused…

Conversations with my mother

I was talking to my mom the other night, she had shoulder surgery and I went over to check up on her and I was telling her about my manager, Tank (whom she knows), and the experience he had last week. Back years ago, when he had first received his embalmer’s license, he got a case, a young woman who had been murdered, and it was his first homicide. She had been pretty badly beaten, and he embalmed her and also met with her family, and he remembers a lot about the case: her name, how old she was, the family, etc. Apparently there had been other murders in the area all by what looked like the same person, and the man (I’m not just assuming it was a man, the victims all had been sexually assaulted and there was semen found on them) had never been caught. So, the other night he was watching the news and he heard that a man had been convicted of these murders from the time period and in the same area as this gal, but no victim names were mentioned in the clip, so he googled the story, finding the name of the girl he had embalmed decades ago as one of those victims this guy had been convicted of murdering. Pretty effing crazy, no?

So, I tell this all to my mom who is shocked that Tank remembered, and then she looked at me and said how sad it was.

Mom: That’s so sad, Doll.
Me: Yeah, but sometimes people die that way.
Mom: No, I mean that he was so affected. How awful.
Me: It’s not that bad, mom.
Mom: But it stayed with him all that time. It must have really weighed heavy on him to have stayed with him for so long. How awful to have had to work on a homicide. You’ve never had to do that, have you??
Me: Work on a homicide?
Mom: Yeah.
Me: Of course I have, mom.
Mom: How sad!!
Me: It’s part of the job, mom. It’s helpful.

So, I was thinking about it, my poor mother, all doped up on surgery meds, being surprised at the fact that I’ve worked on homicides, when I know she and I have talked about it before. Hell, I was a mess a while back working on the little one (4 years old) that had been murdered and bawled my brains out at her, so I know she knew that I’ve had to do that before, but I think it wasn’t until Tank’s story that she realized that some of this shit doesn’t go away. Some of it just stays with us. He will always see the marks on that woman’s body, remembering how he had to cover up the strangulation marks on her neck so that her parents and sister wouldn’t see the extent of the damage done to their girl, and that will always be part of the game. I will never forget that little one, and cannot seem to escape the knowledge that they suffered. Suffered badly, and for what reason? I remember my tears falling on the child’s arms as I dressed the little body, and watching a father place them in a casket that shouldn’t even be made that small.

So, I guess what I’m trying to say is that my mom is right. It is sad. And I think I am starting to understand that it might hurt every now and then. But it’s my job. And I love it. And I think I am starting to realize that it’s okay to be affected, at least every once in a while.

In which I am a little freaked out by the casualness of a dying man

I don't make a lot of pre-arrangements here at work.  Not that they aren't common, they are, but we have a pre-need guy on staff that does a lot of them, and I tend to be busy making arrangements or working services for people that have already died, so the pre-arrangements that I do tend to be few and far-between.  It's always nice to do them, though, as I get paid comission on top of being on the clock, but anyway, I need to get to my story.

Yesterday I was getting a case ready for viewing (he was already in the casket, I was just adjusting his make-up) and Tank came in to let me know that there was a walk-in pre-arrangement that he wanted me to take.  I said I'd be there in a minute and asked him to take the gentleman to an arrangement office.  So, I go in to meet this guy and introduce myself, and I notice that he is fairly young for pre-arranging, probably about 45 or so, and I start talking to him about what it is that he wants to do (burial or cremation, pre-paid or not, where his ashes are going, etc) and he tells me that he wants to do everything (sign all his own cremation forms, pre-pay).  So, I am asking him if he wants to pay it all at once or make payments over time (since for someone of his age making payments can work out to be actually cheaper than paying it all at once), and this is what he says: Well, I am checking into the hospital in February and don't plan on coming out, so I think I'd just like to pay you all of it at once if it's okay.  Needless to say, I was a bit speechless.  So, I fumble over a few words and get (somewhat) back to business, but I couldn't help myself, I had to ask him: Why are you dying? HONESTLY FOLKS, I CANNOT BELIEVE I SAID IT.  Wtf? Why are you dying???? Why did I say that??? So, immediately I say: I'm sorry, that was really personal.  But he smiles and tells me that he has leukemia.  It's the worst kind, and chemo is needed for the brain cancer that he now has, and it's just poison so, he is ready to die come February.  He told me that he has a daughter, she isn't yet 18, and that he just doesn't want her to have to deal with any of it.  So, I asked him questions about dying, and he told me that everyone dies, and laughed a little even at the oddness of telling a mortician that everyone dies.  I have to admit, it was quite ironic.  He told me that he was ready to die, and that he just wished he would be around to see his daughter turn 18.

So, he left, and I keep thinking about him.  I want to visit him in the hospital, which is strange.  I am freaked out that he was sitting there with me, chatting about dying and stuff, and in a few months he's gonna be in a box in the refrigerator in the back. Dead.

The comfort of tradition

I'm at a service. It's a Rosary followed by a Mass, followed by the cremation of the deceased's remains. Usually when we're as busy as we are right now I don't like working services, as I am constantly thinking about what I could be doing at the office, not thinking about being a great funeral director, but today I am glad to be here. It could be partly because I don't have to go to the cemetery after we finish, which is always cold at this hour and this time of year, but mostly it's because I just need a break, and it turns out this Rosary the priest is saying is soothing me. I love the sound of his voice, and the response the crowd gives. The words sound beautiful and melodic, and I just want to hear them over and over, the rest of the day, and let them wash my tiredness and stress away in a river of peacefull lyrics. I can think here. I can relax. I can breathe.

I don't suppose I will ever know why it is that the words of the Rosary are so wonderful to me. I'm not Catholic, although my mom often tells me that I should have been born her (raised Catholic) and she been born me (raised Presbyterian). There's just something about it having always been done this way, the tradition of the prayers, and the holiness of it all. I'm just glad to be here, at this little church, hearing these words.

Maybe a little late...

So, I'm sorry I haven't updated, here are my excuses: Thanksgiving week = a day off, but not less deaths, so a five day week's worth of work has to get accomplished in 4 (actually more like 3 and a half, we all check out at about noon on the day before Thanksgiving); I've been sick, actually fairly certain it was H1N1, but am now recovering; I haven't felt like internetting much this week for some reason. Anyway, here is a list of my thankful things:

1. I'm thankful for my family. I was sitting with my sister having a beer and I was thinking about how nice it was to have Thanksgiving with a family that I don't dread being around. My mom's side of the family came to town: three aunts, three uncles, a couple of cousins and their kids, my hubby, my daughter, my sister (the one I was having the beer with, the other one was with her in-laws), my parents, and a good friend of mine. We hung around and ate and drank, and it was a blast, actually not too different from any other year, which is probably why I never really thought that Thanksgiving could be a bummer holiday were it spent with family members I don't enjoy. So, there I was, having a beer with my sister sometime on Saturday afternoon, and I was thinking how lucky I am to have a totally fun dysfunctional family, instead of a dreadful yet functional one.

2. I'm thankful for this blog. Another thing I realized while having beer with my sister is that I am so glad I have an outlet for my job. Not that my friends don't want to hear about how work is going, they kinda do, but not in the depth that I would like to share it with them. This blog has been quite the stress reliever, not to mention how it has helped me to feel less like I'm crazy for loving my job, as all of you readers make me feel like there are a handful of folks out there that understand my love for this field, and actually are interested in the goings-on of my day-to-day, instead of being grossed out. It's really pretty awesome to have you guys.

3. I'm thankful that I'm pretty. Yeah, I know it's shallow, and I also know that I might not be pretty to everyone, but I think I'm pretty. Actually, I know I'm pretty, and I'm proud of it. I love my super-short haircut (it's an 8 on the back and sides, a little longer on top, and is usually spiky, or faux-hawked). I love my green eyes. I love my faint freckles. I love my smile. I love my tattoos. I love my style.

4. I'm thankful for books.  I read a bit this Thanksgiving and the following weekend, and I can't tell you enough how much I enjoy a good book. I love to sit in my rocking chair and read, drinking some tea (or beer) and letting the cat sit on my blanketed lap and keep my legs warm.  It's peaceful and exciting at the same tome, which not many things are, and I am blessed to have enough money to spend on books, and a reading family to let me borrow theirs.

5. I'm thankful for my friends.  Really, I'm thankful right now for my friend, J, the girl I blogged about a while back.  She and I haven't been close like we were in the beginning, but she's been amazingly good to me none the less, and has really gone outside her boundaries to be there for me.  She feels like a sister to me, and I am so thankful to have found her. She feels like a soul mate, and I've never had one of those before, and even though typing that sounds asinine even to me, it's true.  I've lucked out really, and am grateful that she's here.

Children and Babies

So, I've been really thinking about the questions regarding children, and I have a few different answers.  People usually want to know how I work on children and babies, like how I don't just cry and cry when I work on them, but they never really ask about the process and how it differs from that of adults, and I'd like to cover all of that here.

Children and babies have higher fat content in their bodies than normal adults, which makes it harder for the bodies of children to embalm as well as an adult since embalming relies on fixing proteins (muscle).  Fat people are a lot the same, the tissue just doesn't "fix" (get firm) as well as in bodies of someone with less fat.  In order to compensate for the higher fat content we usually use stronger formaldehyde content, but that can lead to tissue becoming dehydrated more quickly than in a "normal" case.  with children I try to use the stronger fluid mixed with humectant chemicals, which, if I try to explain, is like injecting them with lotion so as to moisturize the tissue from the inside.

With babies, especially with fetal deaths that were premature, sometimes it isn't possible to embalm them using the arterial system, as it is not developed enough to do much good, and their skin is so underdeveloped that it tears easily and is hard to stitch up any injection site.  In cases like that we normally "pack" them, which means we wrap the baby in cotton and saturate the cotton with embalming fluid, and let the body sit for a day or two.

So that's the technical aspect.

As to the emotional side of things, that's a lot harder to answer.  It wasn't until recently, in dealing with the homicide of a young child, that I had any emotional issues with the death of children.  I don't mean to sound like I am cold, or unfeeling, but I am fairly good at understanding that people, even children and babies, die.  I don't feel like it's fair, and I don't think that I feel like it has to be fair, and I know that me doing a good job, whether it be meeting with the family of a dead child, or embalming them, that it will help a grieving family, and that helps me tremendously.  Usually when a child dies it is because of an accident, or maybe a long-standing illness, and while families have questions about why their child had to be the one to die, I don't tend toward those thoughts.  But then, with the homicide case a little while ago, I was shaken.  I cried when the case got to the funeral home.  I sobbed, I was uncontrollable.  I didn't understand.  I still don't.  I cried when I met with the family.  I cried at the service.  I cried as I attemped to make the little body look like it hadn't suffered.  I cried to my mom, and my friends, and was just not myself.  I still don't sleep well, waking to thoughts and images of the little body.

So, that's what took me so long to post.

Why does it bother me so much?

Manager says to me earlier this week: I wonder how many of the bodies run through here go to Hell. *chuckle*

I can't stop thinking about it.

Ten little fingers and ten little toes

I embalmed a baby today. It was a full-term stillbirth. That will always be one of the more strange aspects of my job. It doesn’t make me sad per se, but it is a very odd thing, to embalm a little baby. They are so delicate and small, and I am glad when I am the one that gets to be their embalmer. It makes me feel important and motherly.

Love, Me

I received an email last week from a gal asking me to participate in a blog post today. After reading the email (and replying just to see if it was some sort of scam) I decided that even though it wasn’t really “my thing” I would do it. She asked me to write a love letter to myself, and the more I thought about it the more I wanted to do it, and there are a few other gals doing it as well. See, I tend to be fairly self-confidant, but as I was thinking about it I’m not sure why I am that way. What is it about myself that I love? Why do I love those things? Anyway, here it is, my love letter to myself:

My Dearest Darling,
I have been thinking about you this week, tying to decide what I could possible tell you to let you know how awesome I think you are. It's funny though, I can't seem to find the right words. Since I've actually always liked that I'm good at lists, here is what I've come up with so far:

1. Your compassion. It isn’t always your best quality, but when you show compassion there’s no end to the care that you will give someone.
2. Your artistic abilities. You are always patient and meticulous in your artistic endeavors, whether it’s drawing a picture or rebuilding a face, you always do a good job.
3. Your ability to not be ashamed. Mostly I’m referring to the tramp stamp you got years ago, but you aren’t ashamed of yourself, and even better, you aren’t ashamed of your past self either.
4. Your friendliness. You have never met a stranger. Even when you sit next to someone at a bar that turns out to be super annoying and crazy, you can’t help but make friends.
5. The way you walk in heels. You’re just fracking sexy.
6. Your thoughtfulness. You always think of others, and whether it’s a little gift you pick up for your sister, a note you mail to a friend, or a text message to your favorite uncle, you let people know they were thought of, and it means something to them.
7. And finally, your passion. The things you love, you love to the extreme. Your hobbies aren’t just hobbies, they’re your everything. You are relentless in your desire for what you cherish and love.

You are an awesome girl, Doll Face, and you will continue to be awesome for years to come.

Love,
Me

Here are the others that are participating:

This is Where I Write - http://rantsnotdrugs.blogspot.com/

Ms. Bea's Helpful Hints Blog - http://msbeahaven.com/ms-beas-blog/

Twenty Twenty Hindsight - http://twentytwentyhindsight.com/

Rollertrain - http://rollertrain.tumblr.com/

Cherry Bomb - http://www.cherrybombnyc.com

A little sad

Every year for Christmas my parents have an "open door" policy of sorts. We have always had the immediate family do the Christmas Eve thing, where we open our gifts and hang out, and then Christmas morning is super laid-back (except for my mom who cooks kick-ass Swedish pancakes and bacon and sausage) and we all open stockings. So every year there are random people over for Christmas morning, friends, co-workers, whoever wants to come over, and we always have extra stockings for people that just show up. It seems weird I suppose, that this huge holiday is always spent with people that we might not even know (aunts and uncles will also bring folks over that we have never met), but it really is awesome. It's one of those things that I hope I do when I'm old like my parents, just have an open door to anyone, even if it's Christmas.

Anyway, for the last five or six years our friends that we hang and drink with on weekends with the two daughters have come for Christmas, as their families are agnostic and don't really do Christmas, and it has been fun. The girls make it fun just because they're kids and it's tons of fun to shop for things to stuff their stockings, and their parents make it fun because they always seem to have this I-haven't-had-a-Christmas-this-fun-since-I-was-a-kid look on their faces when we sit down for breakfast. My mom says that her brothers would have a Swedish pancake eating contest every Christmas morning when they were younger, so I started that with the girls, complete with a trophy that gets engraved each year with the winner and their pancake number that whomever wins takes home, and it's just awesome.

So, this family that comes each year, they bring their (the dad's) mentally retarded uncle, Ben, from Oregon or somewhere, and he has a blast with us. He's not easy to understand, and every year we give him a blanket or something like that, not knowing him well enough to get him something truely thoughtful, but it's always nice to have him there, and the girls adore their great uncle, so good times are had by all. Anyway, Ben died today, after falling and breaking his neck last week, and it's just a bit sad. I'm sad for me, because I know that he's gone and it makes me wonder what happens next, I'm sad for the girls because while I believe in honesty with kids it sucks to have to actually be honest with them and tell them that he's just not coming back, I'm sad for my mom who was sad when I told her and I couldn't take that away from her, and I'm sad for the girls' parents who are going to miss him worse than the rest of us. Rest in peace, Ben, you will be missed.

Thoughts about dying

For some reason I was thinking this weekend about people my age and having our parents die. I’m almost thirty, as is my husband, and as are most of our friends, which puts most of our friends’ parents around 50 or 60. Now, that doesn’t really seem that old, but I work in a funeral home, and it is definitely not uncommon for people of that age range to die, which made me wonder: Which of our friends’ parents (or our own) are going to die soon? I mean, statistically some of us will be affected by the ‘early’ death of a parent, right? If not there wouldn’t be that many cases in the funeral home in that age range. Actually, back in November the mom of my best friend in Jr High died, and somehow they chose the funeral home I work in, not even knowing I worked here. She just dropped dead one day of a deep vein thrombosis or something, and was my dad’s age. I mean, people my parents’ ages have dead parents, so they have to die sometime, and I guess it is going to start soon, or has already. Does that make any sense? I’m not even sure why I’ve been thinking about it, but I have come to the conclusion that I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do when it happens. My friend whose mother died in November, well there really wasn’t much I could do. I just sorta cried on my friend while she cried on me. Looking back it seems selfish, or self-centered to have cried, but I figure I would have cried even having not been the funeral director handling the services, as this woman, for a few years, was like a second mother to me, and honestly, I didn’t know what else to do but cry. There are times when I realize something: No matter how good I am at my job I can’t do the one thing families wish I could, bring their dead relative/lover/friend back to life. It makes me feel a bit inadequate sometimes, even though I know that it’s silly to feel that way, I mean, I am doing the best I can to make everything okay, and I love doing that, it just seems strange a times, doing less than what people wish I could do, however unrealistic those wishes might be.

Funeral poems

Funeral poems are strange things. The poems we have at the mortuary for families to choose to have printed in the programs or Mass cards are nice, and families usually choose from the most popular 6 or 8, and those same ones always seem to have deep meaning to the family,which I suppose gets lost on me, as I read them and hear them a lot.

I had a funeral Mass yesterday that was very large, for a young guy that died of heart problems. The family was all really nice and the siblings of the deceased were my age, so it was easy to talk to them like normal people, not like elders. They were funny, laughing a bit during the arrangement conference which is always nice, and everything went smoothly. It helped too that the parents of the deceased were in fairly good spirits too considering. It really is crazy, the differences between grief reactions of families that are anticipating a death and those that have a family member die suddenly. Anyhoo, after the Eucharist, the Monsignor allowed one of the family members to say a eulogy, and at the end of the eulogy the gal read a poem from The Family Guy:

Oh squiggly line in my eye fluid. I see you lurking there on the peripheral of my vision.
But when I try to look at you, you scurry away.
Are you shy, squiggly line?
Why only when I ignore you, do you return to the center of my eye?
Oh, squiggly line, it's alright, you are forgiven.

It’s strange, but it really stuck with me. Hmmm…

Interesting people

I met with a guy today about pre-arranging his funeral services. He is young (okay, by young I mean 45), and when I walked into the arrangement office I saw that he wore a "free hugs" button on his plaid shirt. Anyhoo, I had assumed that he must have some sort of not-life-threatening-right-now-but-I'll-die-young-of-what-I-have-early diseases/disorders, and it turns out I was right. I mean, it's rare for someone who is only 45 to make their funeral arrangements, because people that age don't tend to think about their own death too often. So, here he is with his free hugs and his disease, and he's happy as a clam, telling me that his 61 year-old caretaker will outlive him and not seeming to have any problems with that. He also told me what a stud he used to be, and how even though he's alone (for the most part) now, that he sure has time to read and work in his garden (he's been on disability for years now so has quite a bit of free time), which apparently is the greatest garden in town.

It's strange, you know, the things that are important...