HW 50

Book: Curtains by Tom Jokinen

Precis:
Working in a funeral home is strange and uncomfortable, to be around all these bodies with no life. The bodies are all dressed up and painted to appear as if they are still alive. It's hard to get used to because it's not natural. In our society we are covering up how death really looks to help people deal with death.

Quotes:
"Why do we each spend up to $10,000- for most, the third-biggest cash outlay in our lives after a house and a car, according to Jessica Mitford, who wrote The American Way of Death- on funerals?"

"To stick to the skin, real makeup needs heat, which the dead no longer have. Mortician's makeup is more like paint. The green woman needs a heavy base."

"His eyes are open one more than the other, but they're dry and foggy. This is the unembalmed, undecorated, raw look of death."

Analysis:
This book is craaaaaazy. It's interesting because I (along with probably everyone else) don't really know about the process of what actually happens to a dead body before the funeral. It's strange to think about how people try to make a dead person look alive, it's not natural. We are trying to make up death to look like something that it's actually not. A dead body isn't supposed to look good. We are separated from death in our society and in order to help people deal with it we make the bodies look good and put them in a box to keep things out when they're buried. We change death from what it really is in order to help ourselves deal with the pain of losing someone.. The book is helping me understand why our dominant social practices around death are the way they are.