I would usher, hand out funeral booklets or do whatever odd job he asked me to do.
The traditional practice of cleaning bodies by hand at funerals spread the virus, which is transmitted by body fluids.
Instead I spent a two weeks shaking hands with funeral directors and going to council buildings and filling out forms.
This is like winning the lottery!" Instead I spent a fortnight shaking hands with funeral directors and going to council buildings and filling out forms.
She came to my wedding; we held hands at funerals, and sat beside hospital beds worrying together.
There is also, in a document Robert Silberglied filled out nine months before his death, instructions in his own hand about his funeral: "Least expensive means.
It was no ordinary quarter: He usually keeps it and another one just like it in a plastic case at home, and as he held the rusty-brown 1996 coin in his hand at a funeral home in Brooklyn on Thursday night, people gathered around and stared at it and touched it, tracing their fingers over its unnatural U-shaped curve.
My job was fairly simple throughout the half day, say hello, do not ask how they are (come on, it's a funeral), hand out pamphlets, show where the bathrooms are, nod in silence, barely smile, look down a lot, cross hands in front loosely, a little like Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge does, do not sit, do not sneeze, do not chit-chat, be serene, and do not, under any circumstances, slam doors.
Old hands at the funeral described feeling the vibration of the tracks, listening to the rumble and trying to determine from which direction a many-ton subway train is approaching.
A few people who attended the funeral handed out fliers announcing rallies to protest the raid on Ms. Spruill's apartment, and criticized the mayor, comparing him to his predecessor, Rudolph W. Giuliani.
