The Last Ride Before Cremation

From Ed -- THE LAST RIDE BEFORE CREMATION

Last year I took a seminar in the University of Dayton's Lifelong Learning Institute called "There's Nothing Wrong in Talking About Dying" -- various speakers including a prominent funeral director here in the Dayton area.  Might as well know these things.

But yesterday, I had an interesting conversation.  You see, the place where I "work out" most days of the week is located just around the corner from a funeral home.  I've often driven by and around back noticed a dark blue Dodge Caravan  with dark tinted rear windows.  Its always parked near the rear garage doors of the funeral home.  My assumption was that this was the vehicle that was used to pick up the body of a deceased person from his or her home.  

Indeed, a little research on my part suggested that one of the preferred vehicles that funeral homes used for this "first chore" was a Dodge or Chrysler Minivan with after-market tinted side and rear windows.  A nondescript vehicle that wouldn't raise eyebrows as its parked in someone's driveway early in the morning.  

In the "trade" these vehicles are known as "first call cars."

So as I was rounding the corner headed to my daily exercise, I saw the funeral home's garage door go up, the rear door of the Dodge Caravan pop open, and a young woman driver (perhaps no more than 25 years old) jump out, go into the garage, and wheel out a gurney with a corpse wrapped in a "vinyl blanket."  The young woman was petite and struggled getting the cadaver-laden gurney into the van.  She picked up one end of the gurney, jostled it to the left and to the right and then gave a nightly shove.  No joke.  But the occupant felt nothing I'm sure (or mostly sure).

Then she stood outside the van and made some calls on her cell phone.  But me being me, thought,  "what an opportunity to have a brief conversation with a person who picks up dead bodies."  So I parked, walked over to her, and we chatted for a couple of minutes.  She told me that her job was only to take bodies to the local crematorium (which she was doing that day) and two other "big guy" employees were the ones who actually went to homes with the Dodge Caravan.  

"So do you enjoy this work I asked?"  I doubt if she'd ever been asked that question and she hesitated for a moment, looked me in the eye and replied with a smile: "Well, its a job.  Somebody has to do it."  I then concluded with a final question: "So how's the Dodge Caravan working out for you?"  She smiled, again, and replied: "We'll keep using it until it dies."  Then she laughed.