3,181 Comments Posted by Lynne

"That vanishing loveliness,
That burdening breath
No bond of life hath then,
Nor grief of death."

"Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light."

"I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the working of some powerful engine, show signs of life and stir with an uneasy, half-vital motion."

Aw, {Twug}

:-)

I am absolutely positive, however, that you don't mean this particular work of vandalism, as this is fairly crappy work. No, let me rephrase that - this is "piss poor," to quote my mother. :-)

wardsman -

Amen. :-(

Everyone who thinks this is so "sexy" should spend time assisting here as well. How is anyone brave who goes into an abandoned morgue? It's easy to be somewhere when there's no actual bodies around. I know because I work in the same building with our morgue (in the basement of the building my office is in) and I walk past it most days (and nights) to get to the hospital next door, even when we have had power failures. Even a morgue with someone in it is not particularly "scary." Now, go into a functioning morgue while procedures are underway and see what is really done - THAT is what takes bravery.

Some people get a cheap thrill out of other peoples' misery. There is a difference between having a fascination with death that is put into constructive uses and being a gawker who profits emotionally off of others' misfortune.

You want a thrill - go out and take some food and a blanket to a homeless person who is so psychotic they don't understand they are freezing or starving to death. That will get your adrenalin rushing but it also might do something for someone instead of allowing you to wet your pants in your own self-projected fear and then bravely take the scary story back to your "admiring" friends, most of whom are too smart to get a thrill that way. And you know, the next time one of them loses a close family member, they will look at you differently because of the way you disrespected the people who have died by making light of their deaths like this.

I have as much of a gallows humor as anyone. However, the fact that people in the MR/DD population are now living past the age of 30 is a huge change in the last several decades, and it is due to the incredible care these folks have received as well as the improvements in equipment and medicine (and funding, obviously). The folks I work with are becoming geriatric now. That is exciting to me, because these folks never used to live this long. At the same time, the group of people who still remain in ICF-MR facilities are those with the most medical challenges, and time is catching up with a lot of them. Every time one of them dies, I lose a little part of myself. I admit I have a hard time when people make jokes about morgues in institutions because many of the people who have died in these places were friends of mine. To go into here and make light of the place, to tag it, to steal parts of it, to take pix of people lying on the slabs thinking they are so brave - yeah, I know it's people just trying to make light of mortality. It's still the place that used to hold the last remains of someone's sister, someone's daughter, or someone's brother. And if that person was related to you, the bravery aspect would disappear and other emotions would take its place.

I love these pictures and I am glad they are here because they tell a fascinating story that needs to be told. They would tell a much better story about all of us if they didn't include people being such (dare I use the word?) asshats to equate walking through an abandoned morgue with a statement of their personal bravery and worth.

The point is to look at BOTH sides instead of wallowing in pity or excusing it all.

Licensed clinical psych, but same dif. ;-)

And dang! You get around as much as I do!

Well *I* am impressed! That's good info. :-)

By God, she's right! I pulled both pix and put them in my Photo Shop program, and they are the same pic.

Good eye, Chey!

Speak friend and enter. ;-)

Oh, for heaven's sakes! 8`-)

Come on, ~Me, how do you REALLY feel about this? ;-)

XXXXXXXXX
OOOOOOOO

Better?

Why, yes, thank you, I do! :-)

[Grins broadly, looks at ground, pokes toe into dirt, blushes with pride]