It’s rare that I share a funeral related story and include the deceased’s actual name.  Except for my personal family, I almost always change the names of those involved for the sake of their privacy.  I’m making an exception for Edith “Edie” Norton and Brian Wilson. — The world goes around because there are people […]

The death call came early in the morning.  I put on my dress clothes, drove to the funeral home, and scooted out of the funeral home parking lot at around 4:30 AM to the Veteran’s Administration Hospice Center. A half-hour later I rolled into the VA parking lot, pulled into the ambulance entrance, and hit the […]

This week we were informed that Senator John McCain was diagnosed with malignant glioblastoma.  The median survival for patients with malignant glioblastoma is 14 months, while roughly 10% of those diagnosed live up to five years. John McCain is the definition of brave.  He was a prisoner of war in Northern Vietnam for five and […]

One.  I don’t want to prolong my life at the expense of quality. We all know that the word “euthanasia” means “a good death”. The antonym of “euthanasia” is “dysthanasia” which means — you guessed it — “a bad death.” On a more practical level, “dysthanasia” is “generally used when a person is seen to […]