Down Among the Dead Men_ A Year in the Life of a Mortuary Technician - Michelle Williams [87]
I tried to take comfort from the fact that he didn’t die alone, and I sincerely hope that being with his beloved wife at the end helped him. I think it might have done.
FORTY-SEVEN
It was at this time that the C word passed Clive’s lips. ‘You ought to think about taking the certificate, Michelle,’ he said. We were sitting in the office tucking into a fish and chip lunch after a busy morning PMing. I thought, ought I? When I made a face he added, ‘Can’t get anywhere without qualifications, Michelle. Not these days.’
The certificate is actually the Certificate in Anatomical Pathology Technology and it’s awarded by what was then called the Royal Institute of Public Health, but is now the Royal Public Health Society. To get it you have to travel to an examination centre – London is the nearest – and sit a two-hour written exam, and then take an oral examination afterwards. Once you’ve got this piece of paper, you can then go on to sit a harder exam for the Diploma in Anatomical Pathology Technology, and thereby progress to more senior positions, but I hadn’t sat any exams for nearly fifteen years and I hadn’t been too hot at them even then.
‘It’s a bit soon, isn’t it?’
Clive shook his head. ‘Naw. You’ve made good progress. You’ll sail through. You’ll see.’
Maddie asked, ‘What do you have to know?’
Clive said airily, ‘Nothing you don’t know from doing the job every day. Procedures in the mortuary, some of the paperwork, health and safety, disinfection, that kind of thing.’ When he said this I relaxed a bit. It didn’t sound too hard. Then he added, ‘Oh, and anatomy and physiology.’
I stared at him, all relaxation a thing of the past. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You know . . . the structure of the circulatory system, the hormone system, how the eye works, that kind of thing.’
‘But I don’t know that!’ I protested. ‘All I do is what you taught me to do, which is take out the organs. I don’t know the names or anything, and I certainly don’t know how the eye works.’
‘You won’t have any trouble, Michelle. Not a smart girl like you. Seeing what you do every day will mean that the names and suchlike will come easily.’
‘But why do we have to know about that kind of stuff? I can do the job just as well without knowing what the spleen does or how the kidneys work.’
‘It’s background knowledge,’ Clive said, although he sounded a bit unsure of himself. ‘In any case, it’s very, very important that you’re up to speed about things like disinfection and all the paperwork we have to deal with. Absolutely vital, that is.’
‘I know most of that already.’
‘This’ll prove it to everyone else.’
I looked across at Maddie, who looked just as sceptical as I felt.
I have to admit that I wasn’t keen on the idea of sitting another exam. When I had walked out of school for the last time I had been as high as a proverbial just thinking that I would never have to have study again, at least not in a school-type way. The idea of doing just that and then having to travel all the way to London not only for a written exam but then to be grilled across a desk made my heart sink. What did it matter if I didn’t have a piece of paper to show that I knew things? I wasn’t planning on moving to another mortuary.
And there was Gramp. Since the news about his illness had come to light, I had seen him grow older, weaker, more delicate by the day. He was fading away before my eyes and I couldn’t stop worrying about him. How could I concentrate on anatomy and hygiene in the mortuary when my beloved Gramp was so ill?
Dad had very different ideas, though. ‘You’ve got to do it, Michelle,’ he said firmly when I mentioned it. ‘You’d be a fool not to.’
Dad is a real brain-box