Too Short for a Blog Post, Too Long for a Tweet 377

 

Here are a few excerpts from a book I recently read, "Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? Big Questions from Tiny Mortals About Death," by Caitlin Doughty.

 

Cremations for very heavy people can take longer, sometimes over two hours longer. That gives the fat enough time to burn away. But at the end of the process, you can’t tell who went in the machine a 450-pound person and who went in a 110-pound person. The flames are the great equalizer.

A typical mortician fear is that a dead person will defecate, purge, or leak a bit when the family comes to visit the body. Who wants the final “memory picture” of Grandpa to be a vague eau de poop? Morticians have a host of tricks to prevent this from happening. Entry-level trick: a diaper. This is my preferred method because it’s non-invasive. You’ll see what I mean in a second. Mid-level trick: an A/V plug. (A/V doesn’t stand for audio/visual. It’s, um, more graphic than that. I’ll let you take that journey of discovery on your own.) The plug is a clear plastic contraption that looks part wine corkscrew, part plastic stopper for a sink or tub drain. Master-level trick: packing the anal canal with cotton and sewing the anus closed. My personal opinion is that this method is a little much, and we should let our corpses poo in peace. I’m happy to share more fecal opinions, so it’s a shame no one seems to be asking.

We all know the scene: a child running through the house with their eyes crossed, tongue stuck out, and nose pushed up like pig snout. Their long-suffering mother screams after them, “If you keep making that face, it will get stuck like that forever!” Good threat, Mom, but not true. Wacky faces, even the wackiest faces, always pop back into position. (Furthermore, Mom, there is medical evidence all those scrunched, pinched faces are good for circulation.) But what happens if you die making a face? Say, you have a heart attack right in the middle of taunting your mom with an obscene scowl. Will that be your face for eternity? 

The answer is mostly no. Intrigued? Read on.