TGIF

Thank God It’s Friday

When I was a full-fledged funeral director, I dreaded weekends.

That's because I was on call, Friday through Monday morning. Every other, of course, not EVERY weekend.

That means I was working Friday, Friday night, Saturday morning, Saturday afternoon, Saturday night, Sunday morning, Sunday afternoon, Sunday night, and Monday morning.

On top of your usual Monday through Friday business hours.

Throw in holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, sporting events, concerts, you name it.

Being on call means that you are available to the funeral home and to any, and all, calls that come in over that time period.

It might be a florist calling for directions at 7:00 AM on Saturday for that day's service at church.

There might even be a drink call or two on Saturday night testing your patience.

It could be back to back death calls at 2:00 AM; one from a family that is ten minutes away, another from someone who is an hour away.

Both death calls might be an embalming. Better add another few hours to your time.

Sundays were also days to catch up on cremations, if need be.

Rinse and repeat.

Sure, there were weekends on call when not much happened. But I've also had dozens of weekends where I put in more hours then, versus the week.