The idea of death is disturbing to most people. The end of our existence isn't one that is impatiently anticipated. Our doctors and researchers have made great strides in finding appropriate treatments and even cures for many diseases. Their work has enabled our population to live to the average age of eighty. Even though their intentions are good, are they really doing us a favor? The idea of living until all of our body systems and organs are barely working. All of our bones ache; we can barely walk. We lose control of our bowel and bladder functions. Our vision fails, and we lose our hearing. Is this what we define as living? I've always had a strange infatuation with death. My curiosity at times consumes me, yet scares me. It is something we cannot avoid, we do not know when it will come, but it will happen. Death is a part of life.
             I'm not sure when I became infatuated with death; it may have been when my father died. I always wondered what went on behind the scenes, so to say. What did they do to my father's body after he was no longer in control of it? It was seventeen years after his death that I was able to get a glimpse of what goes on after we die. As a nursing student Anatomy and Physiology was a required class that was amazing. Learning about all the body systems and how they function as a whole made me realize the body really is a well-oiled machine, but the textbook pictures and demonstrations just were not satisfying my curiosity. I had to go one-step further. I contacted the county coroner's office and requested to view an autopsy. Many of my family and friends thought I was morbid. How could I voluntarily witness such a thing? Little did I know this autopsy was going to be an awakening for me.
             I entered the county morgue. It was a cool, dark building and there was not bodies lined up in rows as one would suspect. No refrigerated filing cabinets on the walls or smell of death, it resem...