...musical interlude...

This either has nothing to do with being a mortician or everything to do with being a mortician. I am not sure.

i can't believe this video stayed up. this is me writing from 2022.

life, love, sex and death and never in that order

THIS PHOTO IS 13 YEARS NEWER THAN THIS POST

Let's just say this, I am in a bit of a "state" right now.

state

n.

1. A condition or mode of being, as with regard to circumstances: a state of confusion.

Big time. Ok. got it?

For those of you that know me, forget it, throw that away, you do not. Not even close. I am A. Mortician, that is all you know. That being said, let me attempt at blathering on for awhile.

I dodged a particularly tragic pair of deaths this week. Conflicting arrangement times prevented me from meeting with the family of a nightmarish tragedy. Counting myself lucky, I moved on into my week attacking various duties with great abandonment and beautiful hope for the future. Then, a few days ago, I was greeted with my comeuppance. A distraught and destroyed woman on the other end of a telephone telling me that she needed my help. Help with the kind of thing I know a bit about. This is, as they say, not my first rodeo. I listened, I cared, I used "the voice" as best I could. Today, I will meet with members of a family whose lives were changed so quickly and inexplicably that they surely will never recover, never forget and never be ok again. No matter what. My presence in their lives has begun and to my very bones I wish it had not. There are plenty of details here that I will not fill you in on. Details simply outline what is seen at the bottom line. Like an itemized price-list.

My life has changed a lot recently and to be perfectly honest I was doing pretty well with all of it. Given the circumstances, things seemed to be going on as best they could and the parts seemed to be fitting in together as well as to be expected. When that changed this week, I knew I was screwed. Truly and deeply.

One thing that an undertaker needs to do, in my humble and jaded opinion, is to get as close to a family as they possibly can. To attempt to understand what they might need, have questions about or to simply nod and say "I can not imagine". Being there for someone in that time when their loved one has been stripped from their lives is not about comfort to me, it is about presence. That presence hopefully exists out of a sense of some small amount of understanding. While this understanding can come from personal experiences of the mortician, I need it to come from the individual experience that I am feeling with that family standing right in front of me. Standing there crying, broken, destroyed. Sitting across the table in the arrangement room laughing, smiling, and full of hope and freedom from the thought of no more pain for them. In these rooms, at these houses, along the sides of these roads one must be present. One must be aware of what is needed at the time when it is needed.

So over the past week or so this blog has seen a bit of action. A new contributor, new people reading and commenting, new ideas and opinions. I appreciate all of this and wish to turn inward from all of it for a moment. A common thread has emerged that I think needs to be addressed. For me, right now, I could care less about "the industry". Caskets can go on being caskets no matter their type, style, species or gauge. Burial plots with beautiful views can do just that. They have no meaning for me nor do they have any bearing on what is important. All aspects of these items are secondary to the matters at hand. Matters at hand are how we feel and how that affects our ability to move to the next moment.

My eureka moment came to me when I realized that I had no idea what I was doing. Not a goddamned clue. Last night, after the children had been tucked in and hugged and kissed and assured, I sat down to write this post. All I had was tears. I have them now too but they live behind my face, hiding from those who do not understand or have enough on their plate right now. "What the fuck am I doing" I ask myself. What. The. Fuck. I sit here and ask and wait for a family that will arrive and ask me "what do we do now?". I have no idea. none.

All these people, and not just the ones on their way to the funeral home now, ALL of these people, ALL OF US want one thing. We don't want to lose what we love. When we do, we know it, and it hurts. Bad. Schedule 1 Class A triple-double bad.

Time has passed since I began this post and now I have met with the family that I was speaking of before. My pity for them and what they are going through is legendary. They got the raw mortician, the one that does not pull any punches and tells it exactly like it is. They were not ready yet to make all of the arrangements that needed to be made. Neither was I. Questions were asked and answered to the best of my abilities, ideas were laid on the table to be pondered, and a family left this place with more information than they came in with. Their loved ones are still dead and they will never see them again in any way that they desire to. All they want is to have them back. All any of us want is to see them again, to touch them, to speak to them the truths of love. If even for a second. Anything to stop this pain now. Even for a second.

So we wander. We wander around in life taking it all in and hope for the best. We either take it for granted or we don't. Sometimes we get hung up on the little things. Sometimes we don't. I am in the bubble right now. I am on the inside looking out. Leaves are greener, the sky much bluer. Music is not for the background, it is a soundtrack that must be paid attention to. Nothing, is going unnoticed.

So I wonder. I wonder why it is that I can pay so much goddamn attention to all of this bloody beautiful glory crashing all around me that I still have no idea what I am doing. My easy answer is that I never knew to begin with. The hard answer is that for the first time in my life I actually do. Somewhere in between those two answers might be the truth. Maybe not.

Once again I write the same damn thing that I have always written on this stupid blog. I am going to try and end this post with something different. Bare with me.

The funeral industry exists. It is certainly not perfect. None of that matters to me. My job is to help people despite what people do. Rising to that occasion seems very important right now.

People will die. Life will change. Love hurts. I am here. I am now going to go have a cigarette by the dumpster in the alley of the funeral home and think about sex.

I leave you with a poem by Ted Hughes. He is dead. I am using this poem with absolutely no permission whatsoever.

October Salmon

Now worn out with her tirelessness, her insatiable quest,

Hangs in the flow, a frayed scarf-

An autumnal pod of his flower,

The mere hull of his prime, shrunk at shoulder and flank,

In the October light

He hangs there, patched with leper-cloths

All this, too, is stitched into torn richness,

The epic poise

That holds him so steadfastly in his wounds, so loyal to his doom,

so patient

In the machinery of heaven.

I am DeadCentre.

I really wasn't sure what to write here. I'd been asked by this blogs host to make a contribution but I'd had no Xanadu moment; my muse had foraken me. I'd considered at first an introduction of sorts, a precis of my life in the funeral industry since the age of fourteen and subsequent descent into the production line world of corporate funeral care. It's not interesting though, not to me anyway.

Tonight I had my Xanadu moment. Olivia Newton-John rollerskated down the stairs and into the toilets of the Old Cheshire Cheese pub on Fleet Street in London. In the form a a bit of graffiti penned onto the wall beside the cistern above the urinal she'd written; 'Lifes great irony; though the measure of our life goes forward, our understanding of it works in reverse', or words to that effect. I remembered what I wanted to do on this blog. I wanted to cause a fuss, be difficult and disagree with A. Mortician, and that's exactly what I intend to do. It's much more interesting because after so many years caring, I've realised that the caring makes little difference, provided you are seen to care.

My days of idealism are over. What we as funeral directors provide is merely a basic service that any halfwit with a basic education and with provision of a simple formula could facilitate. This is as much the case now as has been since neanderthal man decided to bury his dead rather than abandon them to the elements. They say that prostitution is the worlds oldest profession. The funeral trade however must run a close second; and in that time, our industry has seen It's share of the unscrupulous, the perverse and the socially incompetent.

We've all seen the industry's faults, all of us can share horror stories. Despite my lingering misanthrophy and mistrust however, I can still see a place for those of us who do actually care . We are priveleged to be of such an important service. Not to the dead, but to those that the dead leave behind.

I'll finish with an anecdote. Many years ago, we employed my ex-girlfriend in our family run funeral business. Not long after she started we were entrusted with the care and commital of an old boy who apparently looked very much like the ex-girlfriends sick grandfather. She of course reacted badly and doubted her fortitude. I explained to her what we do in these terms; We provide a service that will remain in the memory of those that survive that nobody else can parallel. You will eventually forget a nice fat tax return, you will relegate the details of a house or car purchase to distant memory; but as long as you live, you will remember the funeral service of somebody you loved.

That's what we do. We serve the living and not the dead and when we care, we get enormous job satisfaction, really.

Deadcentre

Observations on life and death in London later.

something to consider when choosing a casket for your loved one.

I have nothing to do. There are no families to meet with. No bodies to make pretty. There are no projects to tackle. Well, there are ALWAYS projects to tackle at a funeral home but I have pretty much decided that those are not my jobs unless I am specifically asked to do something. I am being paid to be a mortician and not being paid to be a lawn-boy. We already have a lawn boy. Sometimes I am the IT guy. For instance, yesterday I hooked up a 47 inch flat screen TV to a computer with a wireless connection to the network. That was fun. Now on the weekends I have a new and wonderful place to watch streaming netflix. You better believe I do.

The real reason that this monstrosity exists is because we have done away with our casket showroom and replaced it with this screen. Well at least we are getting closer to that dream anyway. Since we leveled the showroom we have been selling out of a picture book and it has been just fine. No one seems to care one bit. Funny huh? You might think that you would want to kick the tires (or tyres maybe, depending on where you are from) on Mom's new ride before you pulled the trigger but apparently not. Herein lies the interesting part to me...

When we had the showroom, they used it. They used it well I suppose. I once watched a Laotian family throw bones and coins at caskets until the right combination came up to make the decision. Many times I witnessed families laying their loved ones clothes into the casket so see how Mom's dress would look against the Rayon, (Rayon chafes you know...). So wow, here we are now, no showroom, no velvet interiors to lovingly stroke, no highly polished stainless steel gleaming under the humming fluorescent lights. How did this change peoples ability to choose? Not one bit. Because we took away their ability to ponder the possibles, they now just flip through the book until they see something that looks decent and point. "That's the one Dad had, that one will be fine". Before, when we had a showroom, they took their time (well, not all did, some just walked in and said, "which one is the cheapest?") and made the decision because that was part of the arrangement process. To a certain degree, that is what people expected to do when they came down to the funeral parlour. We have just taken that away from them and given them damn little choice about it. Is that wrong? Will this influence these people's ability to properly grieve the death of the loved one? I don't know, but I tend to doubt it very much. A casket is a box to place a dead body in and place into the ground. Period. Caskets serve a highly utilitarian purpose. They hold our dead and make them easier to carry.

How much more should caskets do for us? If it is so easy to pick one out of a book, (and people have told me that it is MUCH easier than "going into that dreadful room") why is there so much value placed upon this thing? Why do people care about color, finish, interior, wood species, precious metal, memory drawer, customizable corners, etc. etc. etc? Folks, I can not answer that one. I would not even try.

I write this post, like all of my posts, completely off the cuff. I generally never know what I am going to write about until I am writing it. There are many, many things to say about caskets and I am barely scratching the surface with my musings. Factors included when choosing a casket (if you must) are historic, religious, socio-economic, cultural and environmental. Caskets make us think about what we are, who they were, why we are and what will eventually be. They symbolize death for us and make it real. Caskets are a tool for making the unreal, real.

Hmmmm. I think I better stop writing now.

I can't quit now, I've only just begun.

Folks, prepare yourselves. Morticianswax has a new accomplice. I am quite sure you will enjoy his presence here. Soon.

My ability to keep up with this poor little blog is questionable at best. New blood is needed and I really do believe that with this injection of new ideas we might actually benefit from it. Or not.

No big philosophical arguments today folks. Just a quick post to tell you that I really am going to keep up this time. I have had a lot on my mind this past year and most of it would not allow me to be a very good mortician. Now, as the smoke clears, I see myself finding third gear and pressing upon the gas pedal. It is time to rock folks. Shall we?

Just a few nuggets of wonderfulness for you to chew on

heh heh heh. it's been a year already?

wow. sorry. I guess. poor little blog, so neglected...

I am back. Really. If there is anyone out there that still gets a post feed for this thing well...hello again.

Let's start at the beginning of the new beginning. I am still a mortician, that did not change. My out look on this profession has not changed much either, I think it is rife with corruption, misdirection and greed. I don't do that shit so it has little bearing on me and what I do so there is that I suppose. What has changed in my world of the dismal trade is that I don't care what others do. Doing this job as a zombie (which is another thing that I believe now, I think that if a zombie attack came on, undertakers would really be the only ones that could save the earth. remember that, we may be the only hope for all of humanity in that scenario) will only serve to mess up that individual. People have choices. They can choose to be free and open and truthful or they can choose to bury their heads in convention and plod dutifully on.

My wife and I are divorcing after being together for about 14 years. we are doing this because we need to. Because we want to. It is nobodies business but ours. we have two beautiful boys that will know that they have two parents that not only love them with all of their hearts and souls but have two parents that love each other enough to still be be amazing friends. Friends that were once lovers. People that care enough for one another that they know that staying together will cause them to not be the amazing beautiful people that they are.

I have a new idea for a crematory here where I live. This particular idea would turn the industry completely on it's head. I am very excited about it. It would be called ____________ CREMATORY AND FUNERAL HOME and then underneath the name would read "fuck you, it's cheap" . What do you think? Stripping the business from any sort of compassion or caring and getting down to the business at hand, getting rid of grandma's body. I mean, it is just a body right? Our firm would have death certificate forms and cremation authorizations available on our website. We would accept all major credit cards over the phone. Bringing in your own container for the cremated remains would be encouraged. If you wanted to save another 100 bucks, you could bring your dead to us. We don't care. We would be cheap. you think I am kidding. I am not. This is the model that needs to rise up from the wreckage right now. At least we would be honest...

We spend so much time attempting to figure out how to think based on what other people tell us. what a refreshing thought it is to finally think for ourselves based on how we feel. Anyone out there feel that?

I have never been more ready and optimistic in my life. I am headed off to live with my parents next weekend. This will be in the house that I grew up in. I will be sleeping in the room in the basement that I listened to a CD player for the first time. the room that saw my first porn mags and crusty socks. The room that has the closet I tried to grow dope in until my mom noticed the light coming out of the steamer trunk. The room I cried myself to sleep in when life just seemed too complicated.

Well, life got more complicated than that. A lot more. My path has taken me on some pretty amazing journeys. All of those journeys boil down to one thing. Now. right fucking now. The future will come. The past is gone but never forgotten. Now is when I can be hopeful. Now is when I can be filled with love. The world is truly an amazing place if we are willing to open ourselves up to that.

Thank you to all of the people out there that have been there when I was ready to learn from them. I have become who I am because I took something from every single one of you. I will repay you by dispersing your wisdom to anyone willing to listen.

I am thinking about opening up this blog to a new contributor. After this post I doubt he will want to. I encourage him to read further. It is time for morticanswax to grow into something new and better. -A. Mortician