6: The Funeral (& Other Strange Death Rituals)

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Speaker 1: I'm just a fool way fears, Welcome to death, grief and other shit we don't discuss. I'm Kyle McMahon. I have always hated wakes and funerals. I mean, I get that nobody actually likes them, except maybe coffin manufacturers, but I really really hated them. The entire idea seemed so sad and morbid to me, and what was the point of it. You dress up in uncomfortable clothes and quietly enter a funeral home or church and just kind of keep your head down silently. You never really know what to say to the deceased loved ones. Everyone is sad or crying or silent. You hear whispers, see tears. It's always just been so uncomfortable and sad that I always just felt like I couldn't mentally even do it. So when it came time to plan for Mom's viewing, I was especially torn. I wasn't sure I could handle it at all. I mean, I was barely handling just existing. I had been binging hours and hours of unsolved mysteries, getting lost in other people's unsolved problems because that would distract me from my own that frankly were also unsolved. I was sleeping all of the time. I barely looked at my phone, and that's when you know something is wrong. I was basically just existed. On the other hand, Mom, in her final hours, had asked me to sing the Rose at her funeral. I couldn't not go to her wake and funeral. I just wasn't sure how I was going to actually do it. That's a huge task for me, and I wasn't in the mental space to know I was going to kick ass. But for her, I'd have to find a way. Anyone who knows me knows that I like being busy. I can't not be doing something. I just feel unproductive, which is the very opposite thing of what I was trying to do to get through all of this. I wanted to do nothing. If I slept, I could just sleep through the pain. Right if I continued binge watching unsolved mysteries, I'd get out of bed a few hours later and everything would be back to normal. Right in the aftermath, these two opposing parts were fighting for my body. One just wanted to sleep and mindlessly fill time until time stopped. The other wanted to do something about these circumstances. In the moments that I felt I needed to take action and keep busy. I'd look at pictures of Mom and organize them on my iPad for a photo book I wanted to make. I'd watch videos of her, listen to the voicemails she left. I could pretend that nothing had changed, like she was just at the hospital. But then I had the tasks of learning the rose for her funeral and writing a speech to give during the services. It was all so overwhelming to do anything at all, let alone figure out how to encapsulate decades of a person into a few minutes speech. This back and forth between extreme productivity and extreme nothingness went on for days until it was time for the viewing. Going back to my parents' house was both torture and heaven. I had to get my funeral slash wedding suit, which I kept at my parents for good keeping. The problem is it was right upstairs, right across from Mom's office. I had to walk into that house that I had shared with her dad for most of my life. I had to walk through those rooms where we shared so many laughs, so much love, so many hugs and kisses, so many lifetimes lived in those rooms, engagements, weddings, babies, so many hugs and kisses, friends, lovers, deployments, homecomings, graduations, and everything else a full life of love contained Those moments were all shared in that beautiful house of my parents. And now I had to go back in there. I'd have to walk inside and up the stairs and pass the room where I saw her last, the room she passed away, in the room where she spent the last few months of her life confined to a bed while pancreatic cancer took away the body of my mom, took away the life of my mom. And now I have to go back to that house. But this time wouldn't be looking out the window upstairs for me. She wouldn't be on the couch waiting for me. She wouldn't be in her office getting her program ready for next week's dance class. She wouldn't be there at all, because she wasn't. I pulled into the driveway and I just sat trying to muster the courage just to go in, tears streaming down my face. I wasn't sure that I could do this. I wasn't sure I wanted to do this. Maybe I could just have Dad bring my clothes to my house. I don't really need to go in there, right, I mean, he could just bring it out. In fact, do I ever need to go into my parents' house again? I don't live there anymore anyway. These were just some of the thoughts that were flooding my mind. I wanted to just be away from it all. I don't want to face any of this. But then I remembered what moms said on my last day with her. I need to know you're going to be okay. I had promised her that I would avoiding my parents house for the rest of my life. Isn't someone who is okay? So I gathered up the little courage and strength I had left in me, and I thought, Okay, Mom, let's do this. I hopped out of the car and went inside my parents house, the same thing I had done a million times before. This time, though it was different. It felt empty, cold, missing, And this is not an ock to my dad. This has absolutely nothing to do with him. This was something else. This was my realization that, for the first time in my life, Mom wasn't coming back home. I sat in the living room couch, twenty feet from the door that I had just walked in, and I just sobbed. As strange as it seems, I was thinking just how recently she had touched the very couch that I'm sitting on. This is my parents house, and one of my parents would never be there, at least physically again. After collecting myself, I went upstairs and stopped at my parents' bedroom, barely mustering the courage to look in on the bed she had passed just a few days ago. None of this felt real. It felt like a dream, or more like a nightmare. It was like I was somehow just observing what was going on, like I was watching a movie of my life, and once again, tears streamed down my face. I ran to my room and I got my clothes on. Dad and I drove together to the viewing, which seemed like the longest drive in the world, despite it only being just about twenty five minutes away, and so many thoughts were racing through my mind as Dad and I spoke about run of the mill things, the traffic, the weather, what we were going to do later. It was also farig and yet normal. The closer we got to the funeral home, the more I tensed up, worried if I would even be able to make it in the building. We met the rest of my family at the funeral home, and we all hugged and walked in together, barely speaking any words at all. As we entered the beautiful funeral home, I asked them for a few minutes outside alone. That would at least buy me some time, buy me time for what I didn't know. I was dreading it. Maybe I could just run down the streets screaming and I'd get put into a home for crazy people. That would be a legitimate reason to not have to go in right then I wouldn't have to face it. I wouldn't have to face Mom's viewing. I wouldn't have to face the fact that Mom had passed. I texted Jason to see where he was. He said, he's ten minutes out. Okay, okay, I'll just wait for him to get here. My mind was racing about anything and everything. I just don't believe this is real. It doesn't feel real. It feels like it's a dream, more accurately, a horrible nightmare, and I'll wake up tomorrow and everything will be like it was lost deep in my thoughts, Jason's truck pulled up, and it brought me back to the present. We hugged and I told him through tears, Jason, I just don't know if I can go in an incredible, strong and calm presence throughout my life. Jason understood. I asked if he would go in first for me. We walked in and I stayed in the hallway while he walked into the viewing room. I could hear my family crying. They were in tears. I could hear my Aunt Kim and Aunt Kathie crying. I can't do this. I don't want to do this. After a few minutes, Jason came out to the hallway and suggested that I go in. I knew that I had to. I would regret it for the rest of my life if I didn't go in there, and Jason reminded me of that too. Fuck it, I thought to myself. I just took a deep breath and I stormed in and I looked right at Mom. She was beautiful. She no longer looked like she was in pain. She no longer looked so frail and fragile. Her skin had color again, her lips too. The toll that nearly three years of cancer had taken on her body and her soul were erased in that funeral home. She looked peaceful, and I hadn't seen her a true piece in those same three years, and that made me incredibly happy, But it also made me incredibly sad because she didn't get to experience being cancer free again. A long time dear friend of mom's was a funeral director, and she had wanted him to take care of her after she passed Dad, and I knew that he would take amazing care of her, and he had, and in some odd way, that really gave me some comfort. I kneeled down in front of Mom and began quietly talking to her out loud, whispering, I'm so sorry, Mom, I'm sorry that this has happened to you. I can't believe that I'm here now in front of you like this. Not now. It's far too soon, and you've been such an amazing person with the heart of gold, it's not fair. For a moment, I sat there staring at her, and I touched her hand. It was cold, lifeless, the complete opposite of who she was and how she lived her life. Mom, you were the best mother I could have ever asked for, and I love you so much. I love you so so much, and you mean the world to me. I started getting louder, and I started sobbing hysterically and screaming. It's not fucking fair. It's not fucking fair. I'm so sorry, Mom, it's not fucking fair. Dad or Kathy or someone had come up to me and put a hand on my shoulder, which brought me back down almost immediately. I hugged them and went and sat down on a nearby chair crying. I looked at her, And as I looked at her lying in that coffin, I thought to myself, how surreal this was, how unreal. That's my mom, who I was just laying with a few days ago, telling her how much she meant to me, And now she's not talking back, she's not responding. Those big beautiful eyes weren't looking back at me. There were no big hugs, no big kisses, no beautiful smile beaming back at me. And then it hit me, this would be the final time I see her like this physically. This would be the final time I see my mom in the physical form here on this earth. That can't be true, right, This is that nightmare that I keep having. I'm gonna wake up and realize the last two and a half years was just two old spaghetti in a fever dream. This can't be the last time, right Mom? Is this the last time I'll see you? The words hit me right through my very soul. Mom, this is the last time I'll see you, This is the last time I'll see you. Numb. I felt numb. I could feel the pain, but in some ways, it was almost like it wasn't happening to me. It was happening to someone else, and I'm just observing what was going on. It was like my mind would fracture off when I had too much and I couldn't take anymore. I wondered if this was normal or if I had completely lost it. Is this some kind of thing that your brain does to protect you, or did I lose my mind? I went outside to gather myself, and I began thinking of how beautiful Mom looked. Her friend Mike had really done such an amazing job. She looked like a sleeping angel. She looked peaceful, and she deserves peace. She's had such a rough road in the last two and a half years. Were not kind to her at all. In fact, they were downright horrible, But she finally looked peaceful. Was there something to this? Was there something to this seemingly morbid and torturous ritual? My family came out, and we hugged and kissed and set our goodbyes, and it was frankly awkward. What do you say when you just saw your wife for the last time physically here on earth, your sister, your aunt, your mom. Dad and I got in the car and started heading home. Tomorrow was the funeral, and I had my dear friend Jordan coming over to run through the rows. Jordan Demorist is an incredible guitarist, and he was going to play the guitar on it for me for the funeral. Dad and I talked about that a bit and then went back to talking about the mundane again. It was so bizarre to be running through a list of things to do for your mom's funeral as if it was going through a list of items you needed to pick up at the grocery store. Maybe sometimes we seek any sort of normalcy in these horrendous situations. Maybe that list makes us feel a little more sane in insane times. Later that evening, I had gone back to my parents' house and met with Jordan Dad had asked me if he could sit in on us rehearsing. Of course you can, Dad. I think it helped him too, to be honest, Jordan and I ran through the rows a few times, and Dad sat in his chair as he had always done, listening intently. This is going to be tough, Kyle, he said. And your mom sure knows how to put on a show. Huh. She asked her son to sing the Rose, She asked you to give a eulogy. She wants Danny Boy to be played on the bagpipes. She sure knows what she's doing. She's sure going for the water works. We all laughed, because it's true. Mom is such an emotionally InTouch person, and she always wore her heart on her sleeve. Her funeral is just an extension of that. That night, I worked on her eulogy for hours, crossing out this section, rewriting that section, tearing the whole thing up, and starting again. How can I write a few minutes speech on someone who loved so big, who hugged so hard, who touched so many. Eventually I was able to finish. I read and reread it what must have been a hundred times. I wanted it to be perfect. She deserved nothing less. The next morning, I woke up and began getting ready. Once again, it all felt so surreal. As I was in the shower, I literally thought to myself, I'm getting ready for Mom's funeral. I tried to fight back tears, but the tears won. What else could I do. I wasn't strong enough to suppress them, and really I didn't want to. I finished the shower, I got dressed, I did my hair. It was just as if I was going to a gig or to an event. I headed back over to my parents' house, and I know this sounds insane, but I actually thought to myself, it's not too late. Maybe she'll pop up like it was a mistake, like maybe she was just in a coma or something. And I thought, then these can't be normal thoughts, right, Like this isn't something you should be thinking, but I was. Dad was waiting outside, and we got in the car and took the drive. Anxiety was seeping in, but I did happen to notice that it was a beautiful day. It was sunny and bright, just like the day's Mom always loved. Before I knew it, we were pulling into the church. The parking lot was completely full, and due to co restrictions, the church could only have two hundred and fifty people. We were very concerned that people would be turned away and come to find out they were. People had gotten there an hour before to ensure that they could get into Mom's funeral. Later, Tad and I ended up laughing at the thought of it. Mom's funeral is a sellout, standing room only turning people away at the door. We had even live streamed it so that people who were turned away or were unable to attend because of COVID would still be able to watch. And she's absolutely loving this right now. But it shows. This is how she touched people. This is a reflection of the life she lived, of the love she gave. I was able to get through the rows barely, but I did it thanks to Jordan knowing me so well. He could roll with any punches I threw. I gave my eulogy and barely held it together. I was just here a couple of months prior, giving a eulogy for the other rows in my life, my mom Mom. This very same church, at this very same altar. I looked out into the crowd of sad, crying faces. How is this happening? After Mom's eulogy, I sat down at my seat in the pew and the entire thing was just completely surreal. How could Mom be in that box? How could she just not be here anymore? How is any of this happening. The rest of the funeral was a blur, and I honestly felt like I was outside of my body watching these events unfold. I remember Dad making a joke about something the priest said, which gave us all a much needed moment of levity in a nearly unbearable situation. I stared at Mom's beautiful casket, holding onto her ring, projecting my thoughts towards her. I did notice that every single seat in the church was full, with people standing in the back as well. That is how Mom touched people. That is the power of her love. Finally, the funeral ended and the procession back out began. It felt like the funeral both went on forever and flew by at the same time. I remember a sea of people hugging me and giving me well wishes. I remember there being so many people outside who weren't able to get in, and me saying to Dad, mom is just loving this. After the funeral, we went to the graveyard. Like all of this, this was really, really, really tough for me. It was a beautiful day, but it felt like the end of the world. The cemetery was beautiful and it seemed peaceful, but it was also a place that held such great sadness, loss pain. By the end of the ceremony, which felt like forever, I was wailing. My mind was filled with thoughts about how this would be the last time, and physically with her body. The ceremony went on and it was just a blur. I lost the strength in my legs, nearly falling to the concrete ground, but Jase grabbed me and held me up. At the end of the ceremony, Dad, beautifully dressed in the US Navy regalia, had one last thing to say to her, jo Anne McMahon, US Navy wife, I relieve you, and Dad saluted Mom's casket. Sobs rang out from the numerous people who were there, But besides that, the place was eerily silent. And that's ultimately what cemeteries have always represented to me, sadness and pain. Why do we stand in a field and cry? What does it mean? How did these rituals even come about. I traveled to Wilmington, Delaware to talk with McCrary and Harrah Funeral Home and Crematory vice president and bestselling author Todd Harrah. I speak with Todd about the history of funerals and death rituals and why they've become so important to us. Up next, Harrah is probably not what you think of when you think of a funeral home director, and therefore he's breaking down the stereotype of what it means to be in deathcare. When I first met him, in fact, I said to him innocently, man, you look like a frat bro. Turns out he actually is a fraternity brother. So Todd took it as the compliment I meant it to be. Todd graduated Suma kum Laud from the American Academy McAllister Institute of Funeral Service, where he received the prestigious Doctor John McAllister Memorial Award, and he has an extremely impressive professional resume. Todd is an Amazon bestselling author, having authored several books about the funeral profession. His new book from Sounds True Publishing is called Last Rites, The Evolution of the American Funeral How does one even begin to learn learn about death rituals. Todd said, he went all the way back, honestly, Kyle, I started it at the beginning with with with the Egyptians. You know, they were the ones that you know, first came up with mummification, which is a little bit different than than embombing. The end goals are different, you know. Mummification was the end goal of that was to preserve the body forever, okay, and in doing so, the mummification process, you know, basically rendered the remains unviewable by today's standards. So embombings a little bit different. Um, it's temporary preservation, and what the definition of temporary that can vary a little, you know, two weeks, six weeks, Okay, every case is different, but it's the goals of embombing are to disinfect the remains so they can be viewable for a you know, public or even private viewing before final disposition. You know. The research was kind of like following breadcrumbs, you know. You I would start here with an idea, and if that didn't pan out, then I'd think, okay, well how about this, and then one thing would lead to another, and it was just like stepping almost from here to here to hear, And I kind of did that, you know, a lot of times with every chapter, and you know, the one chapter would kind of then segue into another, even though you know, at the beginning of the project, I did have a roadmap of kind of where I wanted to take the project, you know, and of course I spend a little bit of time talking about, you know, the Egyptian and the Roman funeral practices, which you know hugely influenced the funeral practices of today. But you know, try to get into um, you know, American burial practices as quickly as possible, because of course that's the focus of the book. What would you say was the inspiration behind today's death rituals in America? I would say there's there's maybe a few, um, certainly here in America where you know, embombing really took hold and took off. Definitely, you can trace a straight line right back to the Egyptians. Um. You know, that's that's kind of the eight hundred pound gorilla in the room when talking about funerals, embombing, you know, other parts of the world that have different funeral customs, traditions and rituals embombing's not such a big piece of the puzzle, but here definitely, m I. You know, I spent an entire chapter talking about the Egyptians because uh, you know, that's such a big part and a rich part of our in America's our funeral heritage. I think the other interesting piece is in Rome, that's the first time we see a secular or undertaker. Okay, uh, in every other point in history, the people that are you know, kind of I'll call it controlling the dead, not caring for the dead, because the family would always care for the dead, you know, as far as washing them, anointing them most of the time, but as far as controlling the rituals surrounding the burial of the dead. Typically in all other points in history, you've got a religious person or entity that's controlling that, whereas in Rome you have a secular funeral directors what we call now or undertaker, who is you know, the master of ceremonies, which is you know, kind of a direct correlation to what we see today here in America. How in America have we evolved in our practices? Like from from my understanding, embalming kind of became a necessity during the Civil War like to bring so soldiers home. Were those practices then, any kind of driver behind what we do today. Sure, so there was, you know, and these numbers vary, but six hundred and fifty thousand men killed or died of disease during the Civil War and only about five percent of them made it home for burial. Okay, so think about that. That's that's a pretty sobering number. Only about thirty thousand families got their loved one, their soldier back, and you know, compare that to the military today and the ends they go to to make sure our soldiers are returned. But at that time, there was just no infrastructure in place for you know how devastating the Civil War was, and really it was a function of the trains. The baggage handlers would not handle decomposing remains, you know, and there was just no really methodil ology for them to control it. At that point, there was a thing called a fisk metal burial case which did seal, but think about it, it's wartime irons at a premium, they're making munitions, so fisk cases became incredibly hard to get and expensive during the war. So the only other alternative was these embombing surgeons. Typically they were doctors, okay, took this kind of obscure European anatomical practice. So they were using you know, preservation techniques and chemicals prior to this, but mostly to preserve cadavers for dissection for medicine. So a couple of these doctors that knew of this, these techniques and these chemicals, you know, thought hey, I can turn this into a cottage industry. So they went down to Washington, DC, and you know, essentially embombing was born almost overnight, and they were embombing soldiers so chemically preserving them so they could be shipped home back to their families. And during that time you kind of see this transfer of knowledge from these embombing surgeons. You know, there was very few of them, but they had assistance, So this knowledge transferred from these medical men to their assistants who weren't medical men. So you see this knowledge transfer to non medical people. So after the war you have people that know how to embomb and chemically preserve people. And this is when you start seeing kind of the the rise in America of the secular undertaker. So no longer is it somebody we'd call tradesmen undertaker like my three greats grandfather James and his son Isaac Okay, who were cabinet maker carpenter by trade, but also dabbled in undertaking on the side. You start to see this emergence of a person whose sole job it is to you know, undertake the responsibilities of burying the dead. And they're not only versed in, you know, obtaining or making the coffin and arranging for the grave to be opened, but they've got this whole new piece of the puzzle chemical embombing Okay, And that translates today in that you know, a lot of states issue what's called a dual license. You know, here in Delaware where I practice, I have a funeral director an embomber's license, but some states you can get one or the other. You can either be just a funeral director or just an embomber, or get both licenses and be both. So it's you know, we're working with two pretty distinct skill sets. Are there things that in death rituals have gone in and out of I don't want to say fashion, but like fashion in regards to our few hundred years of being a country. Yes, I'll give you an example something I found very interesting is mourning jewelry in Colonial America. You know, families were obligated to give out gifts to the mourners that came to the funeral, and it came from England, you know, the practice of giving dual Okay, it's a Latin term for you know, giving a gift in grief. And over in Europe and Great Britain they would give out mourning cloaks. Here in America, the gifts were varied. It could be a bottle of wine. Gloves were very popular, scarfs were popular, and jewelry mourning things were very popular. Now, obviously this was a great expense to the family, you know, giving out rings to one hundred people. So these were eventually, you know, phased out by legislation, honestly. So in Colonial America you see morning gifts being very popular, one piece of that being mourning jewelry. And once they were kind of legislated out of existence, you see a resurgence here actually starting with World War One. So you know, in Victorian America you see these these very kind of grand and overt displays of grief and mourning, you know, with the black clothes and the weeper arm bands, which during World War One this became a moral issue. You know, so many people were being killed in Great Britain and obviously Europe, but in America that the British stopped with the morning clothes, and Americans quickly followed suit. You know, we came into the war, I think four years after them, So the British were the first to drop the kind of Victorian mourning garb, and Americans followed it quickly because, you know, returning soldiers and family members. You didn't want an entire community of people walking around in black while your son, husband, brother, whatever, father is over you know, in the trenches. So you see this resurgence of mourning jewelry. You know, it's it's kind of a subtle thing, but the rings, the brooches, they came back into fashion during World War One, and I think it's very interesting to kind of see how it's transitioned into it's making another resurgence in the form of cremation jewelry. Cremation jewelry is very popular right now. You know, you can get a little locket or even a ring and put a small bit of cremated remains in that piece of jewelry. And wear it around and that's a memory of your loved one. And you know, it's subtle. I think it's a great way to remember somebody. But but for me, as a very amateur historian, it's it's fascinating to watch how that that morning jewelry has kind of segued from you know, our very beginnings all the way up till present day. That's super super interesting. There's this company called, I think it's a Varna or something like that, that allows you to take your remains from your loved one and turn it into like a crystal or whatever that you can then well like wear them. I'm assuming that's something more recent that's not like something that was done hundreds of years ago. Oh no, no, you know it's people come in and tell me, you know, I saw this on the internet. I saw that. You know, as far as what you can do with cremated remains, you know, you can even have them pressed into a vinyl record. Um, you know, the skies the limit with what you can do with cremated remains as far as remembrance products, which I think is great for the consumer that you have all these options of how you can remember them. I have a vinyl record collection, you know, so that would be something that would be you know, meaningful for me, maybe more so than a locket, but you might be completely different. So so yeah, the the internet and cremation has made kind of this whole uh you know, remembrance thing that's definitely expanded far beyond you know, morning jewelry and just opened it up so people now can remember and grieve however fits them best. Why why do we do death rituals? You know what I mean, Like it seems it seems like a silly question, but in some way, you know it. Why is it important to us? Is it respect and honor for the dead? Is it you you know, religion, religious customs, you know, a mixture of both. I mean, I assume that it started with religion. It certainly did, and that plays a big part in it. But I mean that that's a very kind of multi interesting question, the multifaceted question, I would say, kind of the pat answer is our death rituals, our grief rituals are there to kind of get the survivors the bereaved started on their grief journey, so that is their first step to begin the grieving process. And the big pieces of those are you know, first of all, you know, to acknowledge the death, okay, and come together as a community for you know, community support, the community to come out and support those bereaved, and there to be public acknowledge and also you know, to be a place for you know, a safe place to have a public showing of grief. You know. The the religious funeral certainly can is the place for that, but a secular funeral accomplishes the same thing. So I would say those are kind of the elements or at least some of the elements that that the brieved kind of you know, a definitely helpful, uh necessary in starting that grieving process because Kyle's as you know, grief you know, has no timetable, it has no end um, there's no set pattern for grieving. Uh So you know, frankly, it's probably going to go on the rest of your life, just in a different um you know volume, if you will. The volume will decrease as as you move further and further away from the the event um you know, and then you're just figuring out how to you know, reorganize your life to live without that that person. You know, you never get over it ever, But the funeral can be the starting place for you to start to reorganize your life and move forward with healthy grieving. Yeah, one of the things that I'm learning through doing the show, through doing the series is that you don't ever stop grieving. You don't stop missing that person. It doesn't get easier, it doesn't get better. You will love and miss and mourn them forever. You just learn how to live with it, you know. And I love that you said that. You know, that funeral and viewing process is really the first step and kind of setting the rest of it in motion, you know, regarding viewings. What in America started that tradition? Like why did that become a thing? Why not just go right to a funeral or you know, like how did that happen? That's that's a great question. That's that's kind of an age old fear um. You've heard the term wake correct, So that was literally sitting with the remains um waiting to see if they would wake up. You know, different cultures have been doing this and and still do it for centuries prior because there was no really until maybe a hundred years ago, there was no reliable test for death. That the um that the culture accepted. Sure, the stethoscope was invented in the mid nineteenth century, but I would say, you know, as as a culture, uh, you know, we didn't accept that. Okay, you know, when somebody has been pronounced dead by this method, that's that's fairly recent in our history. Um. So for years and years and years, um, you know, we would sit by the bedside and you know, frankly wait for a sign of decomposition. That was the only reliable way to tell if somebody was truly dead and not in you know, what they might call suspended animation or apparent death. And you know, there's all these horror stories going back through the years of people that were thought to be dead and we're not. And some of them are true. You know, you've got to really dig into them. Some of them are pure myth, you hear, you know, some of these stories, you know that have just kind of expanded over the years, and when you kind of really bear down onto them, it's their complete fabrications. But there are, you know, absolutely instances where you know, people have been thought to be dead and they're not. And in fact, the the first cremation and here in America not the first modern cremation which took place in you know, i'll call a retort, that's the cremation chamber. The first cremation was a guy by the name of Henry Lawrence. He was part of the Continental Congress, and he had a number of children, and one of his children was thought to be dead. They thought she had contracted smallpox, and they set her by a window. Okay, this was in the summertime while they went out to dig the grave, and summer storm came in and the rain blowing in the window onto the baby revived her. Okay. And it's thought that this, you know, almost live burial of this guy's child is what kind of triggered something in this guy that he instructed his family members that, you know, when I die, burned my body. And Henry Lawrence is one of the first recorded cremations in America, and he was cremated when he died. So, you know, for a long time there was there's this absolute fear of live burial. George Washington instructed his secretary to Bias Lear. He said, you know, wait three days until you put me into the tomb. So it wasn't this fear that was, you know, for just eccentrics. This was a fear that was for everyone to make sure somebody was truly dead. So that's where the you know, the modern tradition of the viewing comes from is um, you know, the sitting bedside vigil with somebody to make sure they did not wake up. The modern tradition of the viewing came about from fear, the fear of nobody wanting their loved ones and certainly nobody wanting themselves to be buried alive. It's interesting to me that such a powerful and universal death ritual here in America sprung about not from religion or culture, but from fear. In fact, beer drives a lot of the things we do as a society when we come back. I asked Todd if it's true that bells were once tied to the fingers of the dead, and if it remained silent, they were in fact dead. But if it rang, they had been buried alive when we come back. In his latest book, Last Writes, The Evolution of the American Funeral, Todd goes into great detail about the death rituals throughout history that affords what most of us through today here in the United States. Religion is always a big driver of death rituals. For instance, into beet when you pass, they place your body out in the wilderness for the wildlife to consume you. While it sounds really morbid, the thinking behind it is that you have taken from the earth your whole life, and now you're giving back to it, helping to complete the circle of life. Another driver is fear, whether that fear is your God being angered or disrespected by something you have or haven't done, or it's fear relating to the possibility that you aren't actually dead. Fear seems like a pretty good reason for some of the death rituals we engage in today. Just as recently as a few hundred years ago, some would tie a bell to the finger of their deceased loved one and their coffin, called a safety coffin, which would have the string come all the way up from their finger six feet up through the ground and tied to a bell that would ring if their loved one was in fact alive. But that's not the only use of bells helping to alleviate fears of being buried alive. Todd explains, forgive my uh my German, but they were building dead houses, and I thought, I think they called him leechen Houser where they would take There was one in almost every town, and they would take the dead and you know, tie a strength of their finger that was then tied to a bell in a kind of a main attendance room and if you know, the bell rang, the attendant would say, okay, you know this person is uh, you know, in fact alive. Now, in my research, I didn't find any instances where you know, somebody legitimately, you know, woke up from being dead in one of these German dead houses. None were built in America. There was a plan for one that I read somewhere, but it was never built in America. Americans would would you know, literally sit bedside vigil in their house. You know, at this time, home funerals were still the norm. You know, when somebody died, the family would typically wash and prepare the remains or call for somebody called the layer out of the dead, who was also usually the town's midwife. And so the layer out of the dead would come wash and dress the remains. If the family wasn't comfortable doing it, they would send for somebody like my three grades grandfather to build a custom built coffin. They would send the measurements with the courier because coffins were built to order back then, not like today, And the coffin would be brought to the house and typically, you know, the funeral would be held at the home and then born to the cemetery. You know, either was maybe a little family plot in the yard. You know, they could carry it or you know, put it in a wagon or an early hearse and take it to you know, the town's burying ground or the cemetery. Where do you see American death rituals, you know, viewings, wakes, funerals, burials. Where do you see that going in the future. You know, is this something It doesn't seem to be something that has drastically changed over time in America anyway, you know, I focus on this in the last chapter of the book, and primarily in the book. You know, I'm looking at a lot of different alternate methods of disposition right now in America. The two main ones are cremation. I think this year, you know where it maybe fifty seven fifty eight percent of Americans or choosing cremation over burial. So the last chapter of the book is looking at disposition methods of you know, what might the future hold. And when I first started kind of outlining this book in twenty eighteen, this natural organic reduction wasn't even hadn't even been invented, so to speak. I think that first it was signed into law in twenty nineteen, maybe put into practice in twenty twenty in Washington State. So as I'm writing this book, this new form of disposition comes out, and natural organic reduction is human composting. And now there's four providers in Washington State and two other states are offering it. Okay, so you know, we've got an alternate form of disposition that has essentially entered the marketplace. Americans can now choose something else other than burial or cremation if they'd wish. Of course, there's alcohol hydrolysis, which most consumers you know, haven't heard of or don't know too much about that. Yeah, it's the sometimes called flameless cremation water burial. Essentially, what you're left with after the process is something that looks very much like flame cremation cremains. Uh, there's a little bit more because you know, you're doing a water disposition rather than a flame, and the flame can be desiccating, so that's why there's more of these alkaline hydrolysis cremains leftover, but also looking at green burial and green burial cemeteries. And then there's you know, kind of this very theoretical Promessian which is essentially, in a nutshell, freeze drying. You know, I don't know if that will ever be a form of disposition right now. It's kind of um, you know, science fiction, if you will, but the idea has been theorized, and who's to say that you know, that doesn't become a form of disposition in twenty years, fifty years. Oh sorry, sorry, sorry, So I've got to ask by freeze drying, do you mean like I'd look exactly like I do right now, but but i'd be dead. So the way I understand it works is the remains are freeze dried and then essentially shaken up, so the end product would be something akin to cremated remains, but the only difference would be it would be yours or my remains with the water taken out, so it would be different than cremated remains. And you know, you could use these mains to you know, plane a tree or something so very very similar. I guess in the end product to natural organic reduction in that the end products you're getting is soil that you can use for you know, whatever planet, tree, you know, plane, a garden bed or something. I'm thinking I'm thinking like when you said freeze drying, I'm thinking of like you're thinking of cryogenics. Yes, yes, I always joked, or you know, maybe it wasn't a joke, but I always say I want to be like stuffed, like put roller skates on me or whatever, and then put it in my will that I'm gonna be like you guys are not getting rid of me, so everybody, you will rotate having me for like two weeks at a time. You wheel me into your house and then I'm there chilling with you. Well, I have been taking a taxidermy class. Really, I'm kiddy. But when you said that, it's sort of like wow. But yeah, I guess it could be more like cryogenics, which is super interesting as well from the standpoint of you know, the ceremonial aspects. So that's disposition, what happens to the body, you know, the ultimate thing that's going to happen to the bodies where it's going to remain forever. But as far as ceremonial aspects, part of this this leadership class with the NFDA and that's the National Funeral Directors Association, and our our final project is, you know, how do you foresee the future of funeral service And my group is doing it on virtual reality funerals. You know, in this profession, we saw a drastic shift in technology during the pandemic. Okay, I would say before the pandemic we maybe would webcast I don't know, six funerals a year. We offered it. Our equipment at that time wasn't the best, but there wasn't a demand for it. And now the consumer that walks through the door, they're expecting you to offer that live stream as a standard service. So, you know, we've upgraded our equipment, you know, the qualities much better. We've created the infrastructure that we can easily do that for every family that walks through that door, so they have it, so the grandson that's studying abroad in Germany can participate in those funeral services. I think it is wonderful that we can now draw more people into the services and they can feel like they're part of it, but we're thinking a step down the road, Kyle. We're thinking about virtual reality funerals with VR goggles, which there might be a time in the future when you're sitting on your couch and I'm sitting on my couch and we're wearing VR goggles, but we're going to a virtual place and paying our condolences to missus Smith whose husband died, and you know, I'm shaking your hand, but I haven't left my house, And that might be the way the technology is going. At least that's our that's our project is talking about v our funerals. So you know, I don't have a crystal ball. I don't know what the future will bring. But if you look at snapshots of the funeral experience in one hundred or fifty year increments starting from the first settlement at Jamestown, you see the funeral experience in America changing. Okay, it changes so slow we don't realize it. But when you look back at those blocks of time, you're like, wow, these are some big changes. So what's going to happen in the next hundred years. What's the funeral experience going to look like hundred years from now? I can promise you it won't look like the funeral experience today, but I think it will still serve the same goals of starting families on the grieving process. That's pretty incredible, Tide, you know. I mean I just didn't even think of and especially for like our generation, you know, I mean, the possibilities become endless with that. I mean, like you said, you know, if you could have instead of just watching the live stream of you know, the funeral, you could be there in VR, but you're you know, you're on your couch in Germany or whatever, right, I mean, that's really it's really really really incredible stuff. And I never I never really even thought about that or think about this. What if we got to a point in time where the technology was such that the deceased could deliver their own eulogy via a hologram or you go up to the monument in the cemetery and you scan the little QR code and up pops the deceased to share a memory with you, or share a story or something about their life. You know, I definitely think at some point in our future we're gonna start seeing things like that where you know, we can use technology to it'll definitely change the funeral experience and you know, hopefully make it more meaningful. Yeah, I mean, you know, that just blew my mind. I mean that's pretty crazy, and it for me anyway, I'm like, I'm that type of person that I want to feel and hear and see that sort of thing. So what better way to you know, Thankfully, from the day mom my mom got diagnosed, I saved all of her voicemails that she left me. I emailed them to every email I have, every email address I have, just in case one. You know, every time I would see her, I would take picture selfies with her, and even sometimes I wouldn't even tell her and I would just be like, she'd be telling a story or whatever, and I would just record, you know, just because I wanted to have that conversation forever. And from you know, from what you're saying, those are those are things that we could build into the death process going forward. Yeah, you know, take those those photos, those videos, those voice else and engineer something like they did with um the Kardashian Uh. You know, there could be a time when they can you know, kind of take this amalgamation of you know, images and recordings and maybe make something if if the family or the decedent didn't have the foresight to do it themselves, it's a possibility kind of like overwrite them the morning slash grieving process ahead of time. You know. I mean that's pretty uh, that's pretty powerful stuff. Yeah, how do you? How do you do this? You know, it's gotta be tough for you, Like I thank god there are people like you, Dad and you know who can do this because I could not. But how do you do it? It's it's one of those professions. You know, it's a lifestyle, um, and your your family, you know, thankfully you know, I was already doing this when I met my wife, so you know this this has just been the way we live. And it's one of those professions that you know you've got to love or you're going to get burned out. And it's also one of those professions that you know you've got to have an outlet or a hobby or the you know, the stresses the emotions of some of the things you see. Um, you know, could you lead somebody to you know, I don't know, have a drinking problem or something destructive? Uh? You know for me, that's that's writing. Um, you know, I it's kind of my hour at night when everything's quiet and I can be creative. And you know that's the way I blow steam off, is is you know, kind of solving these little historical puzzles and putting them down into written form. But you know, I'll be honest with you. You know that this job can be tough. All deaths are sad, you know, some are tragic, and it's it's the some of the tragic ones that that you know, really kind of stick with you. You know, for me personally, I have children, and you know, children's deaths are very, uh, you know, emotionally taxing on me. And I think a lot of funeral directors would would tell you the same thing. But at the end of the day, it's all worth it when that you know, family, you know, comes up to you after the fact, or write you a little note and says, you know, thank you, mom, dad, whoever it is looked great, looked peaceful. We appreciate you being able to give us this opportunity. And you know, I can read between the lines. I know what they're telling me. You know that they're essentially saying that, you know, I accomplished my goal. I was able to get them started on that that grief journey and provide them with a ceremony that was meaningful. You know, I'm not going to say satisfying, because you know, honestly, who wants to go to a funeral. But it's something that you know, I think is certainly emotionally necessary for us to do. And you know, if we do it right the ceremony, then there can be you know, a lot of healing in that ceremony. The power of death rituals became so apparent to me as we planned and lived through the ones we help for Mom. I almost didn't go in that room, you know, and thank God that I did, because it gave me, you know, it helped those traumatizing images of my mom that were in my head, of her like last days, It helped them to become a bit less intense because I got to see her the way she always was, and that is super powerful. You know, It's been super helpful for me because imagine that otherwise I would have had those super strong, horrendous images burned and my mind forever as the last time that I saw my mom. Where now that's like, that's not what I think of when I think of the end, you know, I think of those moments of her looking beautiful and peaceful, peaceful and like she did my entire life. That's powerful stuff. It is it is. I'd called out a good funeral, okay um, and and that's that's the goal, exactly. The experience you had. Sure was it a difficult day, probably the most difficult of your life. But you know, I'm glad that you're sitting here telling me. You know, I had no regrets. This was my experience, and hopefully it puts you in a space where you know you're able to move forward without complicated grief. And that's that's what the funeral does. It doesn't really matter what religion or race, or creed or culture you come from. It doesn't matter what country you live in. We all honor are dead in some way, and it's almost always sacred in some ways. The death rituals we perform aren't as much for our loved ones as it is for us. We need these things to help us prepare to even go on at all. Grieving is tough, and it's hard, and it never ends. Could you imagine grieving without having a funeral for your loved one, without having a quiet moment with them and awake or a viewing it would make the unimaginable even more unimaginable, and that is why we do these death rituals. On the next episode of Death, Grief and Other Shit we don't discuss, I discuss my social system and how it got me through and in some ways made things worse. Then I talk with doctor Jesse Stern, a research psychologist at the University of Virginia. Doctor Stern and I talk about how social systems can help and hinder the process of death and grieving. For more information and resources, please visit our website at death and Grief dot com and join the conversation on our Facebook and Twitter. I'm going to see my mother. Just Google. No, Buttor, I'm just