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OCTOBER 16-22, 2003
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Death and a Salesman BY YVONNE ZUSEL | STAFF WRITER
hanging in his house to remind himself that he had a father. Don, his mother and his two younger brothon Wolfe sits next to his casket and greets ers moved to Rankin after Clarence’s funeral the people who pass by. to be near his mother’s parents. Four years “How are ya?” he asks one couple. later, Don sat in class. His mother had breast “How you doin’, Henry?” he says to a wrincancer. His aunt opened the door to the classkled, white-haired man. room. “Donnie,” she said, “You’d better come “Good to see ya, Jeff,” he tells a man walking with me. Your mother’s dead.” In that with his family. moment, Don hated his aunt. He was embarDon knows nearly every person who walks rassed, sad, ashamed. by. And they know him. They know that most In a town of 600, everyone knew. They felt of the time when an old-timer passes away or a sorry for him. They meant well, but he hated it. teenager dies unexpectedly, Don will be called He didn’t want their pity. He remembers the to organize a funeral. Recognition and warmth way it made him feel, and he uses it as a rule to fill their eyes, and they stop to chat and shake conduct his own business. No pity, just comfort his hand. A polite “Hello, Mr. Wolfe,” will not and understanding. But although he hated the do, because this man is their friend, a local fixpity, he appreciated the support the community ture, and so only, “Hey Don, how’s it going?” provided for him and his family. Food and flowwill suffice. ers were brought to the Wolfe house almost Although Don genuinely wants to talk to daily after his mother’s death. Almost the whole them, he is also here at the Hoopeston Home town came to the funeral. It’s Expo to sell his services. He this kind of love that Don knows friendliness is the best doesn’t think he’d find in a public relations. Nestled big city. between booths hawking tan“In the city, if your neighning and cell phone services, bor dies, who the hell cares?” the Wolfe Funeral Home booth he says. “Here, everybody seems an oddity. Don knows knows everybody, everyhis is a hard sell, and so, with Don Wolfe body helps everybody.” all his 45 years of businessHe thinks this desire to man’s experience, he smiles, help others might be why he schmoozes, kills them with wanted to be a funeral director. But it’s another kindness. He cannot afford to let a person pass one of those things he can’t remember. He without asking how his wife is doing, or how guesses it also had something to do with his the business is going, or if he’s enjoying the parents’ deaths. good weather. It’s the Catch-22 of Don’s life. Don’s mother’s parents raised him after his These people are his friends, but they’re also mother died. His grandfather passed away potential customers. when he was 23. He remembers feeling sad, but Don can pick a person from the crowd and what he remembers is the way the funeral automatically retrieve their vitals. They are his director came into the hospital room, set up his friends, and he will be sad when they die. Yet cot next to the bed where his grandfather lay their deaths won’t shake him. He has a built-in and yanked his body onto the cot right in front defense mechanism that allows him to show the of Don, his grandmother and his brothers. By family of the deceased compassion and underthat time, Don knew he wanted to own a standing, but which also allows him to view funeral home. He vowed to himself death as just another part of life. It is this attitude then that he would never do a that gets him through; everybody dies, and why removal in front of a family. And shouldn’t he be the one there when they do? he never has. In 1943, Don was 6 years old. It was late and Don knows he built a he was in bed. He heard screaming. It was his wall around himself mother, Lucy. He got out of bed and saw after the deaths. strange people walking around his house. Because he was Clarence Henry Wolfe, Don’s father, was dead. forced to deal A car accident. There was a long drive from the with death Wolfe home in Kankakee to Rankin, his father’s at such hometown, where the funeral was held. His mother leaned over the casket, crying: “Wake up Clarence. Wake up, you can’t do this to me!” That’s all Don remembers about his father’s death. He doesn’t remember how he felt. He doesn’t remember if he cried or if he was scared. He doesn’t remember much about his father at all, but he keeps a picture of him
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Here, everybody knows everybody, everybody helps everybody.
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a young age, he believes he has had practice at being compassionate but not emotional at the funerals. On a warm, bright Wednesday morning, people start arriving at the Hoopeston Wolfe Funeral Home for the service that’s scheduled to begin in an hour. With 6,000 people, Hoopeston is the largest community Don serves. A 68-year-old man lies in the polished wood casket, hands neatly folded across his middle, paper-thin eyelids closed and glacierwhite hair neatly combed. Earlier, Don’s son Roger, who has helped his father run the funeral homes with his brother Royce since he finished college, had dressed the man in a gray suit and arranged him in the casket for the visitation. A folded American flag and a Billy Bass singing fish sit in the hollow of the casket cover, an homage to the Korean War veteran and fisherman. Don sits behind his desk in a small office at the back of the funeral home. Don is only two years younger than the man, which until recently wouldn’t have made him think twice. But two years ago, he had a stroke and a heart attack. Don gets up from behind the desk. He’s dressed in a black suit and a black and white tie. He shifts his weight to his left side, onto a wooden cane with a shiny marble top. He walks as if with three feet—left leg and cane down for a beat, then his right leg. He is not as active as he used to be since the stroke, doesn’t do body removals as swiftly as he used to or do as many embalmings as in the past, but he tries to attend all the funerals. He ambles slowly toward the family—cane-left foot, right foot. “I want to extend my sympathy to you on your loss,” Don says in his deep drawl. He is talking to the dead man’s sister, a
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OCTOBER 16-22, 2003 | WELL SHE TRIED TO THINK OF SOMETHING TO SELL AND ONLY SOLD HER DIRTY SOCKS.
DEADLINE: 2 p.m. Monday for the next Thursday’s edition. small woman with a tear-stained face. “Thank you, Don,” she whispers. “I hope everything is to your satisfaction,” he says, putting his free hand on her shoulder while she nods. “Everything is excellent,” she answers. Don wants her to know he feels sorry. But comforting the family of the deceased is part of his job as funeral director. He likens the job of a funeral director to that of a film director: He is in charge of everything from start to finish. He knows that when somebody dies, family members don’t want to have to worry about how they’re going to move the flowers from the funeral home to their house (Don or Roger drives them over after the funeral) or who is going to eulogize the deceased if they didn’t belong to a church (Don knows clergy of all denominations, and, sometimes, if he knows the deceased very well, he will do the eulogy himself). He knows people don’t want to worry, and so he makes sure he takes care of everything down to the last detail. He doesn’t want the family to worry. After he talks to the man’s sister, he walks back to his office. A short, compact woman with square glasses comes in and stops in front of his desk. “Well, hey Joyce,” he says, as he eases himself into his chair. “Hey Don. Did Bonnie tell you I have a joke for you?” Joyce Buckwaller is an old family friend. Don has buried both her parents. Her daughter is also married to the deceased man’s son.
1 bedroom loft. 204 Clark. $585. Cable included. Call 390-0959.
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CLEANING
2 BR’s centrally located near transportation. Apartments now available. No pets. $450/mo. 352-8540 days, 355-4608 pm/wknd. www.faronproperties.com
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