I think I spotted Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Lessons from the Crematory by Caitlin Doughty on the New Books shelf at the library; regardless of how I found out about it - I’m glad I did.
Doughty - “a twenty-something with a degree in medieval history and a flair for the macabre” got hired at a crematory, and this book is a combination memoir/coming of age story as well as a meditation and reflection on how Americans approach and cope with death.
Doughty reminds me quite a bit of Mary Roach – in fact, I re-read *Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers * after finishing this book – they both take a quirky, light-hearted look at death, while still respecting the humanity of both the dead and the living. Doughty gets a little more “in the trenches” (so to speak) than Roach, as she actually worked at a crematory, with her usual assignment being that of placing bodies into the actual furnace, then collecting the cremains afterwards. However, she would also go on runs to retrieve bodies, and interact with the families.
Among the anecdotes (and considerable gallows humor) Doughty comes to the realization that modern-day Americans (and perhaps Westerners in general) don’t really cope that well with death and dying, and we need to explore better options. She plans out various alternate funeral practices - and attends mortuary school with the intent of opening her own business. The book ends before she starts that next phase of her life, but she is well on her way. Jessica Mitford would be proud, I think.
Recommended to anyone interested in personal approaches to death and dying, allowing for some gallows-style humor along the way. I can see revisiting this book in the future, and will have to look around her website http://www.orderofthegooddeath.com/
Courtesy of GoodReads’ “Readers Also Enjoyed” recommendation, I also picked up Working Stiff: Two Years, 262 Bodies, and the Making of a Medical Examiner by Judy Melinek and T.J. Mitchell.
The memoir of a forensic pathologist, Dr. Melinek shares her experiences over her two-years training period, as well as her first year as a New York City medical examiner. While there are moments of humor - Melinek’s story is more somber overall; nevertheless, there are moments of satisfaction when her work proves cause of death for an individual and therefore helps bring about justice.
Be warned - the later part of the book delves into her experiences at Ground Zero. Yes, she was one of the many, many medical examiners at the World Trade Center after the September 11, 2001 attack. She describes how they literally used a “rule of thumb” when dealing with the human remains - anything larger than your thumb was to be given an individual tracking number - in hopes that they could be matched and identified. Smaller items with potential identifiable traits - fingerprints or teeth - were also to be given tracking numbers. She also references the refrigerated trailers (donated by UPS and FedEx) used to store the remains while they were being processed. We recognize the firefighters, police officers and other public safety officials for their heroism that day - but Dr. Melinek and her cohorts deserve our respect and thanks as well. Now I may have to find Who They Were: Inside the World Trade Center DNA Story: The Unprecedented Effort to Identify the Missing by Robert Shaler, Dr. Melinek’s mentor.
