Caleb Wilde

Note: there’s no body on the stretcher.

When you’re a funeral director, your primary concern is people: both the dead kind and the living.  And when you serve people, you do some weird things to meet that end.  Death is all wrapped up in life, in the mundane, the messy, the maddening parts of living.  Since, death is wrapped in life, it’d only make sense that those of us in death care do a bunch of things. Here are 101 things I’ve done.

1. Helped change a random baby’s diaper at a viewing.
2. Removed a dead person’s adult diaper.
3. Warmed up a bottle of baby formula.
4. Wiped a deceased’s person’s ass.
5. Cleaned the funeral home’s toilets
6. Cleaned the morgue floor.
7. Cleaned the blood of the deceased off of his bathroom floor.
8. Shoveled snow at the funeral home
9. Shoveled a path through the snow back to the deceased’s trailer.
10. Gave the deceased’s German Shepherd some water while it sat in the visitation line at the funeral home.
11. Comforted a dog as we carted his friend/owner out of the house.
12. Comforted a family with some coffee from Dunkin Donuts.
13. Made a McDonald’s run for a family during a funeral.
14. Parked cars in a funeral procession line.
15. Fixed a car’s door while it sat in a procession line.
16. Washed a car in the procession line.
17. Washed the hearse a thousand times.
18. Washed vomit out the back of the removal van.
19. Washed blood out the back of the removal van.
20. Carried a dead person down multiple flights of steps.
21. Carried a dead person up from a basement.
22. Carried a dead body in rigor mortis fireman-style off of a toilet.
23. Embalmed old people
24. Embalmed young people.
25. Embalmed my grandfather.
26. Embalmed a motorcycle accident victim.
27. A burn victim.
28. Suicides of all varieties.
29. A person run over by a train.
30. Drove the deceased’s family to a train station.
31. Drove the deceased’s family to the airport.
32. Chauffeured the deceased’s family to a cemetery.
33. Chauffeured the deceased’s family to a bar.
34. Pushed people in wheelchairs into the funeral home, through cemeteries, and out of the way at nursing homes.
35. Helped carry crying people’s purses.
36. Helped carry crying people’s water.
37. Helped carry crying people.
38. Once used smelling salts on someone who fainted at a graveside (wouldn’t do that again).
39. Once fall into a grave.
40. Once helped someone out of a grave.
41. Helped lower numerous caskets into graves.
42. Helped clean up the tent and lowering devices at the grave.
43. Got cemetery dirt on my suit.
44. Got blood on my suit.
45. Got vomit from a dead body on my suit.
46. Got vomit from a baby I was holding at a viewing on my suit.
47. Ripped my suit so far that my underwear was showing.
48. Sweated in my suit.
49. Nearly froze in my suit.
50. Dressed many a man in their suits.
51. Dressed many a woman in their burial clothing.
52. Put a teddy bear in the casket with the deceased.
53. Helped kids put cards in the deceased’s casket
54. Watched people put whiskey in a deceased’s casket.
55. Watched people put a dime bag of pot in a deceased’s casket.
56. Watched people jump into a deceased’s casket.
57. Helped pull them out of the deceased’s casket.
58. I’ve closed the lid of a casket.
59. I’ve closed the mouth of many a deceased.
60. I’ve closed the eyes of the deceased.
61. I’ve closed autopsy Y incisions.
62. Embalmed autopsied bodies.
63. Seen all the insides of an autopsied body.
64. I’ve held a brain.
65. Held a heart.
66. I’ve held the hand of a grieving mother.
67. Listened to the cries of a grieving mother.
68. Listened to the laughter of children at funerals.
69. Performed magic tricks for children at viewings.
70. Played hide-and-go seek with children at viewings.
71. Played hide-and-go seek as a kid in the casket showroom
72. Worked night viewings.
73. Gone on death calls in the middle of the night.
74. Gone on death calls in the middle of a snow storm.
75. Used my Subaru Forester for a death call during a snow storm (the stretcher just fits).
76. Used an old Land Rover for a death call during a snow storm.
77. Negotiated with Insurance companies on behalf of families.
78. Negotiated with doctors on behalf of families.
79. Negotiated between family factions during funeral arrangements.
80. Stopped fights at funerals.
81. Played bouncer at funerals when families don’t want a certain person to attend.
82. Removed people from funerals.
83. Removed catheters.
84. Removed pacemakers.
85. Forgot to remove pacemakers that consequently exploded in the crematory.
86. Taken pictures of tattoos before the person was cremated.
87. Made picture slideshows for families.
88. Restored and photoshopped photos for obituary notices.
89. Wrote thousands of obituaries.
90. Filled in as a makeshift altar boy.
91. Helped fold a flag at a graveside service.
92. Said a prayer at a graveside service when the pastor didn’t show.
93. I’ve been the soundman at churches.
94. Been the DJ at viewings.
95. Helped men at viewings tie their ties.
96. Joked about tying dead people’s shoe strings.
97. Joked with families to help relieve the tension.
98. Hugged thousands of people to help relieve the tension.
99. Listened to people to help relieve their grief.
100. Allowed death to shape my story.
101. Wrote a book about it all.