Meditation 5: Light Will Guide You Home and Ignite Your Bones

I had a dream about Edna the other night.

If you don't know me in "real life," that could seem like a fairly innocuous statement. If you do know me in "real life," then you know that's a bit of a disturbing fact.

Edna is my cadaver.

Everyone in Med School names their cadaver. Each group puts a good deal of thought into it. There are a lot of factors that go into it: most people want to choose a name that doesn't belong to anyone they know. Above that, some people can tell, by tattoos and what-not, what kind of people their cadavers were. These things get considered, and are usually included in the final naming. For example, a military tattoo led Joe's group to name their cadaver "Captain Pete". A tattoo of a name christened Jacob's cadaver.. With no tattoos to go on, but the knowledge that our cadaver was an older woman, Page picked Edna. The name stuck.

There is a lot of debate as to whether it is "right" to name your cadaver. There have been tales of groups who didn't name their cadaver because they wanted to give it the proper respect that its human life deserved. That person had a name, they insist, implying that it is wrong to give another.

But I have a slightly different perspective on the matter. The cadaver used to be a person, a living breathing person, but persona [the attributes of a person] fade when that person dies. The emotions, the memories--these are the things that we associate with death, as much or more than we associate the physical stopping of metabolism, heart, blood.

I view the cadavers has having two lives: the first, they spent with their families. They may have been happy, or sad. They may have had children, successful jobs, a lot of money. They may have been poor. But death is the great equalizer, and all of these bodies are now equal. They are in their second lives. When I was explaining this to Page, how I saw Edna as having two lives, I said, "She had one life, and now she has another." Page looked at me and nodded.

"Her life with us," she said.

Most groups do treat their cadavers as almost another group member. When we are frustrated with fascia or with tiny muscles or an adhesed abdomen, we may throw down our blunts and say, "Dammit, Edna." On the flipside, when something goes really well, when we get a lot of work done, we'll pat her fondly and say, "Good work, Edna." Mike recounted the other day that their group had considered naming their cadaver "Bertha," but had wanted a pretty name. They ended up with Rose. Anna was very distraught when she realized that Eunice's remains were not requested back by the family. She told the story of how she became really upset, to the point of considering requesting Eunice's remains herself.

As odd as it may sound, this is love. Twisted weird love, maybe. But some sort of love, nonetheless.

But in the end, is it all that odd to love your cadaver? I spend more time with Edna than I do with any member of my immediate family. Most people talk to their cadavers, greet them and say goodbye, or until next time. I don't, honestly, know how I'll feel when I leave Edna for the last time.

Which may, in some way, account for this dream I had, its culmination coming when I stood over Edna's current form, yelling at some aggressor that it was my job to protect her. After all, it is.