The One in Which She Talks of Death

Anyone who knows me, is aware that some of the most defining moments of my life actually surround death. My earliest memory is a funeral and in all I've attended (at last count) 23 of the damn things. My own father nearly died once, as many of you know. And perhaps the single most defining moment of my young life is the 3 months I spent caring for my dying grandmother.

It's one thing to see countless corspes all dolled up in funeral homes, another to find your grandmother dead in the middle of the night inside of your own house. This situation I find not creepy, no matter how odd that sounds, but rather comforting. I've witnessed hospital deaths as well and something about the lack of tubes and machines involved with my grandma's death was serene and beautiful. She died happy. That much I know for certain.

There is absolutely, without a doubt, one certainty in life: we will all die. No matter how many anti aging creams you use, medications you take or exercises you perform, you too will succumb to death. I know this because I had an aunt once who lived through a massive heart attack, spent the next 3 years of her life eating rabbit food and walking 2 miles each day only to have Breast Cancer strike her down at her otherwise most healthiest period in her life.

Death is funny that way.

Side note: I like to think if she had it all to do over again she'd indulge in a Big Mac once in a while. Let that be a little food for thought.

So death, the bottom line is this: it fascinates me, I accept it and it frightens the living hell out of me. The one thing I have no control of. What a powerful notion.

Earlier I saw this (thank you Katie) and I've yet to stop thinking about it:

On May 1, 1947, Evelyn McHale leapt to her death from the observation deck
of the Empire State Building. Photographer Robert Wiles took a photo of McHale a
few minutes after her death.

The photo ran a couple of weeks later in Life magazine accompanied by
the following caption: On May Day, just after leaving her fiancé, 23-year-old Evelyn McHale wrote a note. ‘He is much better off without me … I wouldn’t make a good wife for anybody,’ … Then she crossed it out.

She went to the observation platform of the Empire State Building. Through
the mist she gazed at the street, 86 floors below. Then she jumped. In her
desperate determination she leaped clear of the setbacks and hit a United
Nations limousine parked at the curb.

Across the street photography student Robert Wiles heard an explosive
crash. Just four minutes after Evelyn McHale’s death Wiles got this picture of
death’s violence and its composure.

From McHale’s NY Times obituary, Empire State Ends Life of Girl, 20:

At 10:40 A. M., Patrolman John Morrissey of Traffic C, directing traffic at Thirty-fourth Street and Fifth Avenue, noticed a swirling white scarf floating down from the upper floors of the Empire State. A moment later he heard a crash that sounded like an explosion. He saw a crowd converge in Thirty-third Street. Two hundred feet west of Fifth Avenue, Miss McHale’s body landed atop the car. The impact stove in the metal roof and shattered the car’s windows. The driver was in a near-by drug store, thereby escaping death or serious injury. On the observation deck, Detective Frank Murray of the West Thirtieth Street station, found Miss McHale’s gray cloth coat, her pocketbook with several dollars and the note, and a make-up kit filled with family pictures.

The serenity of McHale’s body amidst the crumpled wreckage it caused is
astounding. (via The most beautiful suicide (kottke.org)

You see, along with my morbid fascination with death and dying, I also have a fascination with Post Mortem Photography. This was widely practiced in the 1800s as a way of preserving the memory of a dead family member. Often they had never had their picture taken before they actually died. The dead bodies would be positioned, many times, to seem "alive". Sometimes faces were painted, often photos were taken of the dead body with living siblings, parents or other family members. All in all, very creepy stuff. Several good examples can be found here.

A recent variation of post mortem photography has emerged involving photography of stillborn infants. Once whisked away from family as quickly as possible after birth, parents of stillborn children are now encouraged to spend time with the infant. Many choose to bathe their child, dress it, visit with it and properly say goodbye. Often they take their own photographs (the only they'll ever have), but a not for profit formed called "Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep" which has professional photographers donate their time to take these lasting photographs. I strongly urge you to visit their website and see some of these pictures. Talk about taking the stigma out of death and dying, they are all so beautiful and poignant.

My final example of post mortem photography is the following photo essay: Life Before Death. I saw this posted sometime in the last few months, somewhere I can't remember on the internet. But I've had it in my favorites ever since. This essay deals, in many cases, with cancer patients. Patients who willingly agreed to be photographed before and after death. They are the definition of hauntingly beautiful.

"Death is a test of one’s maturity. Everyone has got to get through it on
their own. I want very much to die. I want to become part of that vast
extraordinary light. But dying is hard work. Death is in control of the process,
I cannot influence its course. All I can do is wait. I was given my life, I had
to live it, and now I am giving it back"

--Edelgard Clavey, 67, one of the participants in that photo essay.