The Funeral Planner (5 page)

Only later did the truth come out, and by then the prize money was long gone. And so was Derek, with his degree in hand and a stellar reputation as long as prospective employers didn’t dig too deeply into his past. And they never did.

After that, I channeled my resentment into a successful campus prankster business. Students would spare no expense to have my company devise clever pranks to perform on friends, colleagues and professors. That worked out great—until liability insurance became a necessity and costs climbed too high to make the numbers work anymore—a classic case of market risk gone awry by greater margin pressures.

Following that I developed Dustin & Destiny Discover, a line of children’s educational video packages combined with arts-and-crafts merchandise. The prototype consisted of two videotapes in the shape of a lunchbox. It included both a story on video and the parts to assemble a product organically integrated into the storyline, such as a homemade bird-feeder. I wrote and produced the story on videotape with the help of Sierra. Unfortunately, that failed due to an issue of real estate. It turned out that the video stores, art supply stores and children’s bookstores didn’t want the product because of “space.” Two videocassette tapes packaged together as one at $19.95 cut down their profit margins as opposed to two single videocassette tapes each selling at $14.95. So in essence the space was worth $29.90 in sales instead of $19.95. That meant a loss of $9.85 in potential revenue to the retailer and subsequent brokers in between. Unfortunately, this was just before the adoption of the new DVD technology, which might have changed the outcome…but then, timing is everything.

It seemed that Derek Rogers and his black dye cursed every subsequent effort I made at launching a successful business venture.

“So what was the name of the laundry business?”

The question floated in the air, riding on the smells of broiled bass, transporting me back to my brother’s kitchen. Though I’m not sure who asked the question. “White Mondays,” I say, finishing the last of my merlot.

“I always loved the metaphor,” says Eleanor. “Top of the week hygiene.”

“What was the result?” asks Laura.

“An endless supply of Black Tuesday remnants for me,” chimes Daniel.

“For about two years it looked like the homeless population of Ann Arbor was in constant mourning,” adds Charlie.

“So what happened to your latest venture, honey?” inquires Eleanor.

My entire family stares with expectant eyes, waiting for me to deliver the details. I take a breath. “For the past year I
was
commercializing an international-art business online.”

“That’s a multi-billion-dollar a year industry,” pipes in Laura.

“A multi-billion-dollar industry? That is unfathomable,” states Rebecca.

My family gets the “art” part, but their eyes glaze over when it’s attached to the words
industry, business, capitalism,
or
commercialization.
But who can blame them? One relative made tenure in the Architecture department of NYU, another joined the Cleveland Symphony as a violinist, a third joined a modern ballet dance troupe, a fourth ventured into art therapy and there was talk of one cousin who lived on an island with a bunch of llamas from which she wove and sold scarves. My language of P&Ls, bottom lines and distribution channels is absolutely foreign to them.

“What happened?” asks Laura.

“Maddy didn’t make it to market first,” I say, trying to give myself a spot of distance.

“Sounds like a new line from ‘The Three Little Pigs’ in a revival twist,” says Daniel, preferring to hear his own wit over how I might be feeling about the whole thing.

Go ahead, add another dent to my psyche,
I think. These are my babies and they were constantly being aborted by outside forces. “You know what? I’m really tired. Where’s that pillow, Dad?”

“On the couch in Daniel’s office.”

“If you’ll all excuse me for a minute, I’m going to lie down.”

I’m like a beloved black sheep, I think. Everyone else in my family is a writer, performer, artist or academic, following intellectual pursuits in art history, architecture, film theory and basket weaving. No one knows anything at all about business, nor do they care to, except for Uncle Sam.

But business was all I could think of from an early age. During art classes in kindergarten, other kids drew pictures of houses and birds. I drew pictures of one-hundred-dollar bills. When I turned eleven I begged my parents for a subscription to the
Financial Street Journal
and religiously read it every day thereafter. Meanwhile, my family members admire Van Gogh, Rodin and Stravinsky, while I desperately want to follow in the footsteps of the Rockefellers, the Warburgs and Jack Welch.

My family is also made up of storytellers. They
love
to tell stories, but I always wonder why none of them ever feature a tale of how to build a business. Instead they focus on how little Daniel got his foot caught in a jack-in-the-box and the firemen’s rescue, or how Aunt Susie lost her paintbrushes in the fishpond and the fish took on rainbow hues.

Not that those stories aren’t wonderfully witty and entertaining, but they don’t provide the experience or knowledge I crave. The only family story revolving around business I have ever heard is the one Uncle Sam told about the fishing lures.

So when I enrolled in entrepreneurship studies, I had the passion but lacked the experience of most of my peers—born into families who lived and breathed business. I risked being a disappointment to my family as I entered a world they did not understand. In turn, it made me even more determined to succeed.

There’s a knock on the door. “Maddy, you up?” asks Charlie.

“Yeah, come on in, Dad.”

Charlie enters and sits on the couch beside me. “So how are you doing, hon?”

“A little wiped out actually. Dad, what are some of the myths around funerals?”

He takes a deep breath. “Tara,” he says.

I nod. He takes a moment and pauses to consider his answer deeply before speaking like Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch. “Well, let’s see. Did you know most funeral homes’ owners started out as furniture makers? People would ask them to build a wood casket, so they began to assume the role of the local funeral director, as well. They used to have professional mourners, too. I remember watching them when my grandmother passed away.”

“Really? Women in black providing canned weeping on cue?”

“All day long, next to my grandmother’s deathbed.”

“How do people regard funerals today?”

“Well, there seems to be a trend away from funeral rituals. Symbols representing death in art and literature are diminishing, too. Used to be, people would wear armbands or hang wreaths on their doors to indicate that a loved one had passed on. Those kinds of rituals are fading.”

“You think funeral services are important?”

“I do. Grief is a solitary, in fact, lonely experience. Without funeral services there would be no public place to express that kind of pain.”

“That’s interesting,” I tell him.

“So is your state of mind. You’re not thinking about doing anything…”

“Oh, like closing my own curtain?” I laugh. “Heavens, no, Dad!”

“I’d like you to find a job in a stable company and get some financial security—stick to one thing, Maddy, and work your way up.”

I sit up. “But, Dad, that doesn’t work in today’s economy. For one thing, it’s no longer a hierarchical path to the top. Old structures are crumbling because the flow of information can’t be controlled, which puts meritocracy in vogue. But if you ask me, merit is based on being a diversified person the same way good investing is based on having a diversified portfolio. That means constant self-reinvention, without giving up your core integrity, of course.”

Besides, I think, I don’t want to function in “survival mode,” I want to live in “thrival mode.” But I leave that part out.

“I wonder if you should consider going to a doctor.”

“Why?” I ask, surprised.

But before he can reply, Laura walks in wearing a warm down coat, offering her goodbyes.

My dad stands up and kisses Laura affectionately. “You have a safe flight home, Laura.” And he exits the room.

“Don’t worry, Maddy. You’ll crack it yet. So many have had rounds of failure and then hit upon success.”

“Thanks.”

“Hey, what about the ol’ love life? You never updated us on that. Care to tell me anything about your current
lovers
before I take off ? Marriage has a way of stamping out firsthand experience. Generalizations will do.”

“Generally speaking, I’d have to say that career goals have a way of stamping out any chance at true love,” I say.

“On that I agree. But whenever you’re ready to choose to be with someone, just remember freedom comes only
after
you surrender to the choice.”

“Laura! Your cab is here!” yells Daniel from downstairs.

Laura hugs me goodbye and dashes downstairs. I walk to the chilled window and stare out at frozen fields of snow. Fat white flakes drift to the ground. I made a choice. I surrendered to a career, determined to get at least one successful company off the ground first. I’m not immune to relationships, on the contrary, I crave one—but I’m afraid it will get in my way. Deep down I’d rather play the results, or hedge my bets, because secretly I do believe a healthy happy relationship awaits me at the end of all this. It’s just that I didn’t expect the career phase to take so long. And now, everywhere I turn, all I see is constant rain—no, strike that…relentless hail.

A heavy drop falls on an owl sitting peacefully on a maple tree branch. The owl cocks its head, ever so slightly, unper-turbed by the flake melting squarely between its eyes, accepting this as a natural part of everyday life. That is true freedom, I think as the sun casts muted shades of orange across the landscape.

“Have you seen my glove?” asks Laura.

I turn around to find her scrambling around the couch. “No,” I reply. “But let me help you look.” I spot it on the floor under a fallen black chenille blanket, another remnant of Black Tuesday. “Here you go.”

“Whew, thank God, cuz it’s freezing out there.” We stand up. Laura gives me another hug. “Aren’t brises wonderful? Except of course for the ‘brisee.’ Seems like anytime you can bring friends and family together it should be…a celebration, don’t you think, Maddy?”

Suddenly it hits me. Why not create a business that makes funerals a celebration of life rather than a mourning of death? Not do away with the grieving process, but alter the way society perceives the whole funeral thing to begin with. Especially with baby boomers aging now, they, who have defied all conventions, would most certainly not stop at death, but defy it, by embracing it and altering it to fit their needs and desires. I feel a click inside my gut. I know I am on to something big, something that could help people, something that could be profitable and something that might even be enjoyable. I can feel the heat of my mission statement start to bubble inside me. Immediately reinvigorated, I walk Laura out the front door, still high from my epiphany, when my ten-year-old nephew, Andy, comes bounding up to the front porch.

“Aunt Maddy!” He plows into me and gives me a big snowy hug around my waist, simultaneously wrinkling brown pieces of paper in his hand.

“Hey, sport, what’s that you’ve got?” I ask.

Andy reveals dead leaves with holes strategically burned into them. My curiosity returns. “How did you do that?”

“Uncle Sam gave me a magnifying glass and then me and the sun co-lab-o-rated to burn holes into them!”

“Where’d you learn that big word?”

“Dad. Then Uncle Sam said it in a sentence, too.”

I nod—
of course.
I look at the spottily burned paper and can’t help but see the immediate potential for a budding enterprise. “That is so cool! Hey, you can turn the holes into designs and start a little business called Leaf Art!”

“Cool!” shouts Andy.

“You could sell them. Then you could take a portion of your profits and use it for charity and future investments. What do you think?”

“Double cool! What can I invest in?”

“Well, savings accounts don’t pay much on interest, so you’d be better off practicing dollar-cost averaging in some sound stocks.” Andy has no idea what I’m talking about but I don’t believe in talking down to anyone, instead trusting that eventually the listener will get it. “What’s your favorite thing?” I continue.

Andy thinks a minute, then lifts his foot. “My boots because they take me everywhere I want to go.”

“Awesome. Okay, what’s your favorite thing to do to help people?”

“I liked bringing Grandma cookies when she was in the hospital.”

“Got it. We’ll take your profits and buy one share of stock in the Skechers shoe company every month and we’ll donate ten percent of your profits to baking cookies for hospital patients. To get you started, I’ll pitch in and buy the art frames for you and make you some business cards. How’s that sound?”

Daniel overhears and smiles. “You’re good, Mad. Like a poet, only instead of finding new meaning with iambic meters, you do it with objects and concepts.”