inherent value
The Nature of Life includes the Eventual Miracle of Death.
—Final Passages Brochure
Isn’t it weird to touch a dead person?” my brother, Paul, asked when our family discussed the inevitable approach of our mother’s death.
“Not really,” I replied. I knew of our mother’s wish to simply have her family be the ones to care for her in a hands-on manner without involving a mortuary. Our mother became acquainted with Jerrigrace Lyons of Final Passages when we called on her assistance for a friend. Our mother had declared, “That’s how I want it to be for me.”
When Mother Iris passed, my brother, our two sisters, and I reverently washed and dressed our mother and transformed her room. The room of a dying woman became a living altar to her—living because the room was filled with her presence even as her now-lifeless body was “lying-in-honor” in a room filled with light and love and warmth and color. Rose petals from the garden just outside the window created a rainbow of color and a delightful scent around her body. Soft music played continuously. A look of peace and ease was upon her face. One of her doggies insisted on staying as a sentinel in the room.
Family and many close friends ventured quietly into the room. Some of them were timid at first, yet they came away feeling a sense of peace after viewing her anointed and honored body lying with a peaceful countenance.
My brother pulled me aside shortly after our family ritual and said, “Thank you. That wasn’t for anyone else to do but us.”
Transformation
Paul’s transformation was a joy to me, even in the grief of my mother’s absence. The reality of this transformative energy is eloquently relayed in a quote on the Final Passages brochure and website: “The Nature of Life includes the Eventual Miracle of Death.”
Brother Paul’s two offspring—Mom’s youngest grandson, Aaron, of eight years and granddaughter, Marissa, of ten years—were among those who were quite timid at first. They held tightly to their daddy’s hand, hesitatingly venturing in to view their grandmother. After that first cautious time, they entered countless times on their own. They hung pictures in the window, creating a stained-glass effect. They got up close to Grammy’s face and whispered to her. They even kissed her cheek. It became their mission to assist others who came by to enter the room. They shared their confidence and let people know how valuable it was to be there. “Grammy Iris is really glad you came to see her and send her on her journey,” they wisely told a few uneasy adults.
My own transformative moment occurred as well. Crying moments after Mother’s passage, I uttered, “I just can’t believe you are gone, that you are not here.”
I heard my mother’s voice distinctly drop into my head. “I’m here. I’m everywhere.” Vibrational chills shuddered through me, and I was instantly aware that I could feel her in a tangible way—in me, all around me; in every breath, I breathed her in. Yes, she was everywhere!
Over the years of being involved in this work, I have seen many versions of this transformation. Timid or even openly disgruntled people slowly, quietly, or suddenly show up with light in their eyes and express their amazement and gratitude that they themselves cared for their family member or friend.
An example of a gentle transformation occurred while assisting with a home funeral of a man who had just died. The sister of the man’s wife was present and visibly uncomfortable. Repeatedly, she voiced her discomfort with seeing her brother-in-law and kept apologizing, saying she was sorry she could not be more helpful as it was just strange and weird to see death so closely. Later, after the wife and I had washed her husband and adjusted his garments, I asked the wife’s sister if she could help pick out fabrics to adorn the place where he lay to make it into an altar. She picked through fabrics and chose the right ones from my collection. She helped drape them around the bed. At one point, I looked up to see her face glowing with radiance. She smiled. “Why, this is just wonderful, isn’t it? It is really beautiful. I am so glad I’m here.”
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These stories are a reminder about how natural death care may be an essential piece in our own process of understanding. As noted in the previous chapter, when this piece of our journey is relinquished or taken from us, we miss out—we suffer. Realizing why and how this is so is part of a mutual exploration with you, our readers.
Caring for our own dead is a means to understand the natural place death has in our lives. It assists us in understanding that someone we love has really passed on. It helps us accept what has occurred and may ease our grief in whatever way might be right for us at the time. Perhaps it makes grief more real, tangible, and important. It gives permission for us to grieve as we wash and dress and anoint our loved one. It gives us permission to speak to that person in a way that we may not have done before when they were alive. It helps us find closure along the way. It does not remove or cancel grief, yet it allows grief—its natural place in the moment and beyond.
Many people remark that they can feel the energy, even presence, of their loved one, although to touch the flesh of their departed is to notice that they are not there. They are no longer contained within their flesh. Their body—where they have resided all their many or few years—is to be honored. Yet the knowledge that they are no longer using that body is a tangible feeling. I recall a young woman saying that touching her friend’s deceased body helped her accept her death. She could feel her energy all around her. The peaceful presence allowed her to feel that her friend was truly all right. She realized then that she, too, was okay. She would miss seeing her and calling her on the phone, yet she knew she could connect with her spirit.
The Ritual Bath
The washing of a loved one’s body is a natural process. The sacred act of a ritual bath is personal and intimate. It is an honoring of the person who lived in that body. No stainless-steel sterile table and unfamiliar hands attend this process. It is an intimate personal ritual.
The ritual bath often provides opportunity for transformation. I recall an incident when the daughter of an elderly woman who died directed emphatically that she wanted us (the home funeral guides) to take care of the washing of her mother. She planned on leaving the room. Yet she lingered. After I prepared the warm water and was about to begin, I sensed the right moment to gently offer her a washcloth. I suggested she might like to just wash her mother’s face. She took the cloth and from that moment on was fully engaged. Merely holding the cloth was enough for her to find her natural place in the process. She went on to help with the dressing and the makeup. Only she knew how her mother would want it done, she said. I’ve often noticed that if the deceased person wore makeup or styled their hair, a daughter or a close friend will know how to most naturally do their makeup and their hairdo.
Dressing the Body
Sometimes a person chooses what clothing they wish to wear at their own funeral. One might confer among friends, “What shall I wear for my grand finale?” When the dying person is aware and preparing for their death, the consideration of what to wear takes deliberate care. Choosing what a loved one will wear often provides a family with a pause that relieves their anguish for a moment. I’ve been privy to long conversations as people deliberate over this question with serious, humorous, tender, and, finally, practical and/or elegant decisions.
One mother knew that although her son was very theatrical, he also loved the idea of formality. The result was two different attires. One initial dressing had a thespian flare. It was a personal view for his mother and attending family who appreciated his look in a flowing gown and turban. Later dressed more formally, he took on a very distinguished look in his three-piece suit, befitting his final viewing among friends.
Remember my friend Annie? She studied law and chose a T-shirt that read res ipsa loquitur (Latin for “it is as it seems,” mentioned in the previous chapter). A long-standing joke we’d shared was about the idea that we could tell what “it” was when perhaps even professionals were perplexed and, from our view, did not have a clue. That shirt over a gray-striped turtleneck, jeans, and a gray scarf was her perfect outfit as she was lying-in-grace on a simple off-white raw silk undercloth with a red and gold pillow cover beneath her head. In her own way, she was exquisitely “as it seems.”
When a person is being washed and dressed, there are opportunities to speak to the beloved and say things that help complete something needed in the relationship. I’ve often been privy to overhearing what was an obviously two-sided conversation. The one side that I could hear with my outer ears often would astound me with its candidly spoken nature, its depth and essential feeling. It suggested an interaction I could only imagine. Later, the person might confide how significant that moment was, and how deeply it helped them accept their friend or family member’s death when they got what they heard from the other side.
Creating Space
When my friend’s son of thirty-three years died, she called me in the middle of the night. I drove right over, as promised. As we washed his body, we cried, and we each spoke to him. I felt him hearing me in a way that had never happened before. I heard my own candid declarations and confessions to him that completed for me a deep forgiveness and acceptance of who he was in my life.
By dawn, his mother was sitting with him. I was doing housekeeping in her living area. Before his death, she had said that she did not want a dead body in the house after he passed. She asked that we find another place for his body until we carried him away for cremation. She called out to me from the room where she sat with her son: “Does Richard need to leave now?”
“No,” I replied, “He does not need to go anywhere until you are ready.”
“Oh, good,” she said, “because Rich doesn’t want to leave here at all, and I don’t want my son to go either!” A transformation had just occurred. Although we had arranged for another place for his body, she now felt differently. She felt communication with her son had occurred, and she was now comfortable with him being there. She said something to the effect of, “His spirit is here, and does not want to be separated from his body yet.”
The room had been very dark and dreary. We opened up the curtains, letting morning light flood into the room. Guitars he played and other personal artifacts were arranged around him. The room transformed into a celebration of Richard and who he was. His sister and various friends commented on how peaceful he now looked. They felt an acceptance of his need to go.
Artifacts from a loved one’s life are an important part of creating personalized energy in the room around their body. If they rode a surfboard or a motorcycle or were a dancer, an artist, or a musician, artifacts from their life journey placed around their body create a sacred space that expresses their essence in a way that no mortuary place could ever replicate.
Lit candles, special music, pictures of them throughout their life, family photos, and pictures of people special to them add to a sense of a person’s uniqueness. Lying-in-honor this way creates a sacred space, a living altar, to honor their life expression. What was perhaps a sickroom becomes an altar full of light, reflecting aspects of a life lived. Added touches such as these also may make it more comfortable for visitors and spark recollections of their friend.
Coffin Considerations
Choosing to build or decorate a coffin is yet another opportunity for completion and healing. Many people find that building or decorating a burial container offers an outlet for feelings and grief to be expressed. It allows the artist in them to emerge. A friend of a deceased woman made a beautiful shroud from fabric covered with dragonflies. Her husband remarked that his wife’s spirit was being carried off on the wings of dancing dragonflies.
Brother Paul insisted that a cardboard coffin, which the rest of us felt content with and even looked forward to decorating, was not sufficient in his eyes for his mother. He was an extremely busy carpenter and yet found time to express his grief and his art in one of the most exquisite and personal coffins I’ve ever seen. The bottom was an elongated heart; the container was an angled, long rectangle; the top was in the shape of a flutterby (original word for butterfly); and the spine of the flutterby was a long, raised redwood piece culled from wood that Mom’s brother, Howard, had timbered long ago. Paul traced, carved, and burnished into the redwood the image of an iris flower our artist mother had drawn. It was a unique tribute to our mother, Iris May.
People find various innovative ways to create a container for a loved one’s body or cremains. There are companies that supply biodegradable containers, shrouds, and exotic containers for cremains. Yet many find that engaging in their own container-making process is therapeutic.
As people share in this activity, they have an opportunity to integrate feelings, sense a spiritual connection with the deceased, and bond with each other. Quiet conversation or even laughter and bantering may occur while people are building and/or decorating a body container. This is providing another gift of healing for participants. It gives a family more ways they can participate in their home funeral. Friends who wish to help may also join them. Some who are more timid about hands-on care of a dead person have a comfortable place of involvement. A place of healing is generated in the process.
Children often lead the way in such an artistic endeavor. One such child-dominated occurrence seemed at the time very disjointed and an uncoordinated jumble of crazy art. The twin great grandsons of a woman of ninety-four years enlivened the event. I smile at my memory of this humorous time. The boys ran about between their own and others’ artistic designs. They used a lot of black paint to outline the art. I felt the outlines might be too dark and cover up the artwork. Yet the result was amazing! It resembled an oriental tapestry. It was beautiful and reflected the life of a woman who loved to travel and had a particular appreciation for ancient Chinese art.
The artistic expression of coffin art results in a priceless container that nothing manufactured with expensive materials could ever match. The shared time enriches the moment and provides another level of acceptance. Like Tibetan monks who, in meditation, create a sacred sand mandala they later brush aside, mourners paint remarkable art that shortly will be cremated or buried along with a loved one. The art becomes a therapeutic outlet. Many coffins are uniquely beautiful treasures, photographed as keepsakes. They add to snapshots of other special moments throughout the home funeral and are kept for later remembrances and reminders of an inner process as well.
Grieving and Its Value
The process of caring for the beloved in the context of a home funeral is as varied as the family who orchestrates it and the life that they honor. A home funeral gets to be however it is. It reflects the values and personality of the person who has passed as well as the perspective and personalities of family and friends who participate in their varied ways. It is a family-directed event. Moments of grief shared and healing energy are an integral part of what is or may be facilitated.
This does not circumvent the grief or the inner turmoil and reflection that the days to follow may bring. Yet all these examples of the process and whatever occurs in the home funeral may be a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and an important avenue for grief’s healing path. It doesn’t supplant the support from others such as friends, pastors, priestesses, priests, and grief counselors. Yet, it does provide a framework for understanding the life-and-death reality in the moment. The energy and support of friends and family will likely be essential in days that follow and at later times as well. The grief of bereavement is especially significant as loss of an intimate family member also incorporates one’s own history.
Grief has its own unique way with us. Each person experiences grief differently. It involves multiple ways to process, accept, deal with, and move through the often murky waters of sorrow and grief. Recovery of natural joy in living takes time. Yet it is the providence of living with awareness that allows transcendence from painful, acute grief to recovery and balance. In 1992, I was privileged to attend a seminar on grief facilitated by Stephen and Ondrea Levine. In the midst of many people sharing deeply their sorrow and pain in personal life tragedies, Stephen said, “It is a wonder that any of us chose to continue to live on in the face of so much pain, yet the presence of magic makes it possible to choose and find a way to live in joy.” (Paraphrased from my memory.)
I’ve suggested ways that these natural homemade rituals may bring lasting value to those living. Yet there is another unknown value about which we might speculate. What is transpiring for the one who has just died? Is their spirit still hovering nearby, watching the care of their body-temple and listening to what is being shared among their loved ones? Some suggest that perhaps even the spirit of the loved one gets to further process their life and feel how loved and seen they are. Many religions and cultures speak of a “life review” that each person experiences after they pass on. There are many ideas about what is occurring for one deceased from this physical life. These ideas and philosophies open another conversation worth sharing regarding current religious philosophies and ancient religious cultures, beliefs, and rites. For now, it is a comforting thought to imagine that, from their mysterious vantage place, a loved one who has passed on from this life can appreciate our personal care and love.
Each home funeral is unique and reflects the family and the deceased person as their own unique energy and values are expressed and enacted. There is no cookie-cutter scenario or exact protocol. The home funeral may be short and simple or long and elaborate. It may be ceremonial and filled with planned or spontaneous ritual or without ceremony and fanfare at all. It may be as simple as intimates holding hands around their beloved and honoring their journey onward. A spontaneous prayer may be offered, releasing a loved one to Divine Spirit (however named). It is an unfolding sacred ceremonial occurrence, whatever unfolds. Many people may attend, or the event may involve only a very few intimate members.
The miracle of death has been honored in life. An innate rite is enacted; inherent value is felt.