Summary

Back home in California, Doughty returns to work at her funeral home where she prepares the body of Ms. Shepard for a natural burial. A natural burial means that the body is not treated with any chemicals and is buried in a simple shroud rather than a coffin in a designated natural cemetery. Because of various regulations in the United States, natural cemeteries are limited and often expensive with companies charging a "'green' premium, even though a natural burial is easier to accomplish" (216). Doughty takes Ms. Shepard to her burial plot out in the desert, where her body disappears into the earth. When contemplating her own death, Doughty would also like her body to disappear, but in a different way. She describes the funeral rituals of the Parsi in which a body is ceremonially treated and left out ritualistically to be eaten...