HomeMy Public PortalAboutHeikkila, Marvin57d Ne 5
July .77, /995.
A mortician's most difficult job -
helping the living cope with death
BY SHARI HAMBLETON
The Star -News
Marvin Heikkila has been helping
his community deal with the reality of
death for almost 20 years.
Although preparing bodies for
burial may appear to be Heikkila's
main line of work at Heikkila Funeral
Chapel in McCall, more importantly,
he helps prepare family and friends to
say good-bye.
"Almost 90 percent of my time is
spent with the living," Heikkila said.
It actually only takes an hour or two to
embalm a body and prepare it for
viewing and burial.
"People always ask me `How can
you deal with dead bodies?' But that
part of it is just a job. Dealing with the
emotions — that's what's tough," he
said. And talking about the finances
of a funeral when someone is an "emo-
tional basket case" is a challenge.
Another difficult part of being a
mortician is being on duty 24 hours a
day, every day of the year, as both a
funeral director and the Valley County
Coroner, he said. "I don't mind it.
Don't get me wrong. It's just hard."
Beepers and cellular telephones
tie Heikkila even closer to his work.
During an afternoon interview
Heikkila answered a telephone call
about every 15 minutes — questions
from those making future arrange-
ments and from those asking about
past services.
Heikkila sits in the lounge area of
Heikkila Funeral Chapel scratching
notes in a schedule planner he re-
ceived from his wife, Karen, as a
birthday gift.
"You know, I was told once that if
something's worth doing in your life,
it's worth writing down," Heikkila
said, nodding toward his leather-
bound planner. Heritage is important
to this descendant of one of the oldest
Finnish families to settle here in the
early 1900s. "You've got to write
things down."
Sunlight streams into the lounge,
warming patches of carpet and falling
across softly tufted chairs and a love
seat where Heikkila meets with those
making funeral arrangements. An
aged stereo in a polished wooden case
sits in the corner. "That's what we call
canned music," he laughs.
The telephone sings again and
Heikkila answers in the same level
but friendly tone he has answered the
past 10 calls, "Heikkila Funeral
Chapel — This is Marv."'
Shari
Hambleton
He pulls out the plot map of McCall
Cemetery to check a plot reservation
for the caller, chats for a moment,
then hangs up. Again, he leans back
and picks up the conversation with
the plot map in his hands.
"People need a place to go back
to," Heikkila said of friends and fam-
ily of the deceased. "The worst fear in
the world is that they'll forget. You
don't. But that's a fear." Heikkila's
gentle demeanor conveys compassion
without it seeming contrived.
"You know the best thing you can
do for someone in this situation?" he
said. "Keep your mouth shut and just
give them a big hug. Don't say `I
understand what you're going
through'... Don't say `I know how
you feel.' You, can't know, unless
you've gone through it yourself."
But Heikkila does know about the
loss of a child, about having to say
good-bye and about making the long
slow steps through the healing pro-
cess of the heart. Heikkila lost his 10-
year-old son in a camping mishap in
1964. He knows what heart -sick feels
like.
He also believes talking about the
grief smooths the rocky road of emo-
tional recovery. "People just need to
talk," Heikkila said. "And it's my job
to listen. They just need to say things
like `My wife made the best damn pie
in the world.' They just need to say
that. When death happens, you tend to
forget the negative things and remem-
ber just the good. And that's okay."
Heikkila and his wife started a
Compassionate Friends group in
McCall about five years ago, he said.
The group meets monthly to lend sup-
port to other parents who have had
children die.
"Some people think (visiting a
cemetery) brings up too many memo-
ries," he said. "But the more times
they can release the grief, the quicker
the healing process. That's basically
what you're doing when you go to the
cemetery."
And remembering - or believing
they will be able to remember — is a
Mary
Heikkila
Valley
County
Coroner
"You know the best thing
you can do for someone
in this situation? Keep
your mouth shut and just
give them a big hug."
- Mary Heikkila
comfort for those left behind.
Heikkila smiles easily, lacking the
generally accepted characteristics of
the movie house undertaker — dark
cloaked and morbid.
Heikkila considers the funeral pro-
cess less a memorial to the dead as a
reality check for the living. "Some-
times we're too protective of people,"
he said. "We don't let them face real-
ity. We're a death -denying society."
"When do you ever see advertise-
ments on T.V. where the people aren't
strong and healthy?" he laughed, lift-
ing his arms in the air in a weight-
lifter's pose in the middle of his em-
balming room. "We encourage people
to come to the viewing (of a body) for
that reason ... to face the reality of
death and come to terms with it."
"I don't like the term `passed
away,' " Heikkila said. "It's like say-
ing `powder room.' It's a ... toilet.
That's reality. People don't `pass
away.' They don't `go to the beyond'.
.. They're dead."
That's not saying Heikkila does
not have a religious belief. He keeps
that mostly to himself. But his phi-
losophy of a funeral as being a cel-
ebration reveals the underpinning of
his Christian faith.
Heikkila said he enjoys his work
but added he has encouraged his three
grown sons to seek another path.
"I guess I have discouraged them
..." he said. "Your life is really not
your own."