The Funeral Planner

The closet is dark all right.

Claustrophobic-dark. Suffocating-dark. And, well…casket-dark.

I plunge through racks of limp, hanging clothes, riffling for one particular outfit, wondering why all closets symbolize darkness.

Doesn't the very word itself — closet — connote a sense of obscurity, a feeling of entrapment, or a space for concealment? And furthermore, why don't closets have automatic lights? Closets with instant lighting would completely do away with their negative connotations. Think about it.

If you grew up with closets that blasted light every time you opened them, you might have a completely different association. One related to openness, illumination and optimism. On that note I ponder, why can't caskets have power-generated lights inside so the dead don't have to feel so alone in the dark? Okay, so they're dead, they might not know the difference, but still…it might make their afterlife adventure less intimidating if they could see, metaphorically speaking, where they were going. It's not such a far-fetched notion. I've heard stories of family members placing battery-powered cell phone ... read full excerpt from The Funeral Planner ebook