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"What We Fear" Fears & Phobias Movies

Death, Fear and Bad Decisions: Green Burial Options

graverobbedHalfway through the presentation on green burial options, I was fully creeped out but not at all by the practical and creative alternatives presented by Merilynne Rush of After Death Home Care. I was terrified by the fact of my own death in a way that was rather embarrassing. I write horror fiction, review horror culture, heck, I even collect skulls and skull-shaped sculpture. I’ve buried both my parents and, within the past four months, watched my brother-in-law die at home, at peace and surrounded by love. My earliest childhood memories are of family gatherings at the funerals of obscure relatives. I know death, right? But the photo of a hole in the ground ready for a shroud burial, a bare cavity in the earth, one without marker or protection from the elements, and I was side-swiped by the fact of my own fragility, mortality and insignificance. And this reaction really brought home the point of the presentation: how many important decisions do we make based on unexamined fears?

I am also no stranger to green alternatives. I’ve tended a compost pile since I was 7, grown at least some of my own food ever since and the grand “circle of life” is a potent metaphor in my imagination. Except, perhaps too often, I imagine the circle going on around me without fully realizing the realities of my own “passing away.” We don’t simply “pass away;” we leave a very corporeal residue. As a culture, we’ve fallen into certain habits for dealing with these physical remains. Embalming, I learned, became popular during the Civil War as a way to ship soldiers’ bodies home for funerals. Ms. Rush’s presentation taught me, however, that in most cases, dry ice can chill and preserve a body more than long enough for public services. Those services can be very personal affairs. Home funerals were common in this country less than a hundred years ago. The photos she showed of such home funerals– all with the complete consent of family — depicted dead persons surrounded with stuff of their lives, a guitar, a hand-decorated coffin, their own bed. The bodies looked peaceful, oddly wholesome, naturally dead without the professional interventions of a mortician. Bodies can be washed and dressed at home and the presenter noted that the task is often an opportunity for those grieving to understand and accept the reality that their loved ones are no longer there. I was surprised by how few legal requirements are actually involved and there are more in Michigan than in other states. If I understand it correctly, only two signatures are needed for a home funeral but getting those particular signatures on those particular documents during a time of grief can be a challenge. Green alternatives to conventional burial don’t just happen without a bit of forethought. The guidance of an experienced consultant like Merilynne Rush of After Death Home Care surely would be helpful.

The ecological impact of our deaths continues on long after our burial, however. Conventionally maintained cemeteries require continual investments of gasoline and attention to tend the grounds perpetually for visitors who might not ever come. Ms. Rush showed various green alternative burial places including a full conservation site that looked like a prairie dotted with saplings. And I found this image as hard to cope with as the one of a naked grave. Weird, right? I feel most alive when I am wandering that very kind of terrain. I have often joked about wishing to be composted when I die, but that humor must have masked some deeply seated fear of passing away without a trace. I found it oddly comforting that State records meticulously record the precise locations of all burial locations. I might dream of becoming as famous as Edgar Allen Poe, whose grave was visited by anonymous libation-bearing stranger every year on his birthday but seriously, is such a nebulous and unlikely dream really worth the real and predictable costs of a traditional grave? I wonder yet again, how many of my life choices are guided and constrained by such unfounded hopes and unexamined fears.

The presentation was hardly dour and grim memento mori. Merilynne exuded a peaceful, reverent demeanor, very conducive to discussing these hard options. She also played a segment of Caitlyn Doughty’s “Ask a Mortician” video podcast. We at the DailyNightmare LURV Doughty’s Order of the Good Death and have linked to her videos in the past. A little humor and good will goes a long way when dealing with such sensitive, final issues.

Are you intrigued by greener alternatives to traditional funerals and burial? If you’re in SE Michigan, you’re in luck. After Death Home Care is sponsoring a showing of the movie “A Will for the Wilderness” a feature length documentary, at the Michigan Theatre in Downtown Ann Arbor, June 1st at 1:00. The film records one man’s attempts to be treated in death according to the values he held in life. Read more at the After Death Home Care site here. in ways that better align with his values in life

Tucked away in the thumb of Michigan is an old cemetery where my people are buried. I visit it usually once or twice a year, pause in front of the stones like a solitary family reunion. My beloved grandmother who taught me how to bake bread, the grandfather I never knew, my uncle who tucked a baby chick under his jacket, my aunt who had all the cats… and also my mother and father are there. But of course, they aren’t there. They’re in my heart, my oh so perishable heart. In a hundred years, it’s unlikely many will have such memories to attach to these very permanent markers. Merilynne Rush’s presentation certainly got me thinking about how I might better request treatment in death according to the values I held in life. I was startled to find that some facets of this question seriously creep me out, a devoted horror-hound. This terror intrigues me. This Memorial Day, consider your notions of what should happen to your remains after death if for no other reason than such unexamined fears shape our behavior in life.

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Nightmares

Nightmare #326 – Deluxe Body Bag

(Male, 50s’) My dad has been gone for over 20 years so I only rarely dream about him but last night, I woke in a cold sweat.

Dad was dead and we had called the company that was going to bury him. We were waiting outside of large building on the sideway. Dad’s body was just lying there on the grass, still in a hospital gown.

A van pulled up and a professionally dressed woman got out. “First I want to congratulate you on your loss.” she said it very matter-of-fact, as if by rote, but it struck me as odd she said “congratulate” instead of “condolence.” But she continued talking her set spiel about how her company would take the best care of Dad. Before I knew it, she had Dad’s body in a body bag. The bag was made of extremely thick black plastic. It reminded me of Kevlar. Before she zipped it up, the woman put a laptop computer in the bag on top of Dad’s torso. “The computer lets your loved one know you cared about them up until the last minute.” She sealed the bag with an air of finality.

“Now, for a small extra charge we can escort your loved one to the van on a rolling cart.” She had already brought out this low wooden cart. I almost agreed but I asked how much the “small extra charge” would be. The woman replied that the cart would cost $150 and it would show everyone how much I cared. I was confused. Why would I spend that much money to have them used a cart to carry my dad’s body less than 20 feet?

I told her that I didn’t believe this was my father any more, just a shell he’d left behind and that I’d rather spend the money on booze for a party I would hold in his honor. Very well, the woman said.

And at that moment, the body in the bag started kicking. It was subtle at first, the legs just curled at the knees. But then the whole body started convulsing. I looked at the woman in case something like this was normal but the expression on her face said it clearly wasn’t.

“Is he still alive in there?” I asked.

The woman nodded but she stood as if paralyzed in fear.

“Then help me get him out.”

“That’s not possible. Those bags are completely sealed. They’re guaranteed.”

I knelt down by my dad’s body. He was thrashing around. Somehow I was then able to see through the heavy plastic fabric of the bag. His eyes were open. He was gasping for breath. But in addition to having limited oxygen in that sealed bag, it was filling up with liquid. He would drown in his own juices within moments.

“Get him out or I will sue you and your company into non-existence.” The woman clutched her clipboard and contorted her face but did nothing to help my father as he died, a second time lying there on the sidewalk.

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"What We Fear" Other Haunts

Video – “Ask a Mortician”

A few years ago I was researching a piece about funeral parlors that I finally abandoned because, I am embarrassed to admit, I was too afraid to actually ask a mortician about specific details of the embalming process. File under “Thank you, Internet:” this running video blog of perky mortician Caitlin Doughty who gleefully responds to viewer questions about death, dying and funeral customs. She runs a website too called Order of the Good Death . com

The videos are quirky and light hearted with plenty of illustrations edited in to satisfy the tachistoscopic tastes of the MTV generation. But Caitlin’s warm personality and gentle wisdom are the real attractions of this vblog.

Check out the first episdoe at least, will ya?

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Movies Other Haunts

Other Haunts – Crotch Rocket to the After World

I’ve often wondered if my 1990 Electra Glide will take me to the grave but didn’t think it might be the actual vessel used. Shows how little imagination I sometimes have.

This youngun’ – shot dead while young enough to leave a beautiful corpse – was allegedly embalmed and mounted on his favorite motorcycle to lie in state. Even if this is a hoax, it’s a pretty fun one, eh?

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Nightmares

Nightmare #137 – Arriving for the Funeral

(Male, Middle-Aged) My wife and I had just gotten into town, a small town with what appeared to be only one stop light and one main intersection. We arrived by train I believe because we exited a large brick station. I was wearing a black suit and black gloves and the only luggage I was carrying was my laptop from work which is in a black satchel. My wife is also dressed somberly. As we start to cross the road, a fancy old-style hearse turns the corner and heads toward us. It’s blaring a siren and flashing its lights which is pretty strange. Where would a hearse have to go in a hurry? We stop and let it pass. I am very tired, maybe from the journey, maybe from exhaustion or hunger. I am fighting to keep from passing out. My wife keeps telling me “It’s just a little way further.”

…They’re walking along, all in black, half like a mob and half like a parade of mourners…

Just as we are nearly across the road, I notice a whole family of people turning the corner where the hearse came from. There’s an older man and woman and their four full grown children and probably a half dozen other people. They’re walking along, all in black, half like a mob and half like a parade of mourners. The mother in particular is highly distraught and cries very loudly into a hankerchief. She keeps choking like she’s trying to stop crying. I recognize the family once they get closer. They must be arriving for this same funeral. They’re friends and normally I’d want to talk with them but in this dream I was filled with panic. I just wanted to get to my hotel room or where ever I was going and close my eyes. The fear of talking with them made me try to escape but I was horribly dizzy. They kept gaining on me and my wife but at last we entered the building where we were heading to. I felt worse and worse with every step, a little like my head was emptying, like my brains were just evaporating and pouring out my ears. Despite these disturbing sensations, I knew I had to hold onto my brief case because I had to do work while I was vacationing at this funeral. My wife was quite a ways ahead of me by now. She opened a door and held it open for me though I realized I would never make it that far.

At just about that moment, I figured out that I was arriving at my own funeral.

Categories
Nightmares

Nightmare #15 – Strange Ice Cream

(Female, erly 80’s) I am trembling as I write this. I just woke up from a MOST TERRIBLE nightmare.
I was with my son and his family in an ice cream store. It seemed very familiar and was the kind of place where the owners lived in the back. However, the ice cream cones all had very strange names. My son’s family all got their cones and as I was waiting for mine, I started to faint and I tried to call for help and hung on to the counter. But EVERYONE had gone.

…I tried to pound on the counter but my arms were LIMP just hanging out of my sleeve and would make no noise when I hit on the counter….

My voice would not come out, only with a squeak. I tried to pound on the counter but my arms were LIMP just hanging out of my sleeve and would make no noise when I hit on the counter. I seemed to know that the owners were in the back so tried to crawl back there. The woman saw me and ran to call the doctor. The man came and I mumbled that my family was out in the car. He let me lean on his arm and we went outside on this very busy street with cars crowded together. I started to fall on the street in weakness and he said, “Don’t do that , here is your family.”

This FUNNY looking little square shaped black car pulled up. My family was all there, but all dressed up in fancy formal black looking clothes and were all squeezed together in this little car. I recognized my grandson, my son and I think it was either my niece or grand-daughter and some other people. I kept saying “Why did you leave me and where is my ice cream cone?” They all had just a very strange smile and did not know what I was talking about just as though it was now in a different time. I asked “Am I dead?” I kept trying to say that I was weak and needed to eat. I remember, at this point I almost realized that it was a dream and I was trying to jerk myself awake. Finally I jerked and broke myself loose and woke up.