“You see,” he begins, “80 percent of people die naked and 70 percent die in the toilet. That means most people die naked in the toilet.”

Boy, doesn’t that pop the long-held version you always had in your head of how you might die peacefully in bed or go out in a blaze of glory a la some heroic movie scene?

Mike Thomas is a contract “body retriever” for the Detroit Coroner’s Office. In an story by the NYT (“Body Collector in Detroit Answers When Death Calls ”, by Charlie LeDuff, published: September 18, 2006), he shared is perspective on life and death.

He is a father of 3 kids trying to make it on 14,000 a year. He gets $14 for picking up a human body, $9 for an animal.

He sees the death rate rising as the economic onditions fall in Detroit. He recognizes friends and neighbors as the violence spreads round him. Yet, he doesn’t sound jaded or cynical. In fact, he seems pretty together. I was struck by the descriptions of him coming into a death scene whistling. He doesn’t lack compassion - I think he’s actually peaceful from having such a clear view of the dance of life and death.

He has a simple theory about his place in the dance: “unemployment leads to drugs. Drugs lead to misplaced passion. Misplaced passion leads to death. And that’s where he comes in.”

As to the big picture: “as far as the afterlife goes, I believe through what I seen that those who commit horror and sin are doomed to repeat life, which is hell.”

Ever notice how it’s the people who live and work closest to the basic expressions of life as it plays out who have the clearest seeing and who seem pretty content? ER nurses, cops, waitresses in all-night diners, janitors, and others who work so very hard at the street level of human existence.

Their take on life is simple and crystal clear. The added dramatic and romantic filters from Hollywood haven’t affected their seeing.

I don’t mean they aren’t struggling to make ends meet with horrible pay and working conditions. But their view on life, who they are, and their place in it always sound to me as profound as any teachings from the Dali Lama for Wayne Dyer.

It is no accident that the collective wisdom on the bookshelves about obtaining happiness and peace speak of the need to simplify our life, get clear on what is truly happening around us and watch out for the meaning we make of it.

It’s ironic that as many of us “move up” in the world, we lose touch with this wisdom and have to go searching for it. I try to pay attention to the people that work up close to the basic elements in life. They see it so clearly. Some of the people most marginalized in our society often have the razor sharp seeing. I learn a lot from them when I listen.

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Tags: Life, Work, Body Collector, career, happiness, mike thomas

This entry was posted on Friday, October 20th, 2006 at 12:03 pm and is filed under Life, Work. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.