In this one episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Commander
Worf sits with Chief O’Brien observing an ancient Klingon rite where they watch
over the body of a fallen comrade to keep away predators until the spirit has
had time to escape the body. I always liked that ritual. And then there was a
science experiment a while back where they weighed a body with this laser
accurate scale and at the time of death the body lightened by this
infinitesimal small amount. They did a fictional account of this experiment in the
Dan Brown novel The Lost Symbol. I
wish I could tell you that once a person dies, their body is just meat. The
logical part of my brain tells me that it is just meat.
You have all these war movies where
soldier put their lives in jeopardy to run out onto the field of battle to
recover the body of a fallen comrade. Now, I have never been in that kind of
combat situation, and I understand that if it was my son’s body, I would want
to have it returned to me so I could give him a proper burial. But at the same
time, if it were me, I would tell members of my company to just leave me behind
and not to risk their lives to recover my body. My soul is set free. Don’t die
beside me trying to recover my body.
There are two different schools of
thought and both of them have merits. I guess it comes down to the situation. Our
rules are pretty simple. Friends get buried. Zombies get burned. But when a
round of relentless cold had made digging pretty darn difficult, we did what we
had to do.
We showed Judy’s body all the
reverence and respect that we could but not being able to bury her, we wrapped
her body up in shrink wrap and then placed her inside two large boxes that were
cut and duct taped together to accommodate her size. It is very similar to what
we did with Keith before we had a chance to reclaim the perimeter around the
store. We then placed her in the ice cream freezer alongside Janet and Ashlynn.
Once a warm front moves in and
things start to thaw out, we will bury her alongside the others and give her an
appropriate headstone. I will admit that it is not an ideal situation but, like
Shala said, “It is what it is.” Not a whole lot we can do about it. The best we
can do is adapt to the situation and move on.
Still, I have to admit, there are
times when I am up on the roof. I cannot help but look to that grassy field in
the east where we can see the markers for all the people that we have lost. At
times, it is humbling. At times, I do say to myself, “Better them than me.”
With Judy’s situation, I don’t think anyone could have called it. No one could
have anticipated a massive heart attack taking one of our members. So, in a
way, I don’t really see her death as tragic. Or at least not as tragic. But it
is still another member lost.
And that guilt can weigh heavy on the
soul…
