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Living don't want to mingle with the dead
• THERE is nothing hysterical or unbalanced about us
not wanting to sleep next to a mortuary (Mortuary at foot of
garden wins backing, Feb 23).
Unless one is into necrophilia it is a natural human instinct
to not wish to have an around-the-clock reminder of death. Hospitals
always see to it that their mortuaries are situated where patients
are not made aware of stored dead bodies. The new University
College hospital has followed this tradition. Their living patients
and dead patients are totally separate.
In hospital, if a person dies in the next bed to you their corpse
is not left lying there, yet this mortuary has its walls as
near to the ends of our gardens as a patient in an adjacent
bed would be in a hospital ward. These are three four-story
houses – many divided into flats occupied by young couples
in their first homes – and from whose back windows there
can be no avoiding the sight of hearses, mourners and mortuary
business. Not, I should have thought, the ideal background for
starting a family.
As a retired nurse I never failed to be awed by the moment when
the amazing human machine stops forever. However, the living
have to cope with life, bring up children, pay rent or mortgage
and for that they deserve much more consideration and respect
than they’ve been getting.
Death comes soon enough for all, without forcing us to witness
its rehearsal on a daily basis. This really is not a suitable
project to be wedged into a residential triangle and, unless
Ms Cassidy has permission to bury on Hampstead Heath, she still
has to transport corpses many miles for burial – thus causing
unnecessary road pollution. Would it not make sense to have
the mortuary nearer the burial sites?
In Dan Carrier’s report it was said that Ms Cassidy hoped
that, in time, we residents would accept the mortuary. Did she
mean like battery hens learn to accept being battery hens –
or abused children learn to accept being abused?
Maybe Jehane Markham or Jon Snow could make room for eight bodies
at the end of their gardens?
Roz Maxwell
Oakford Road
NW5 |
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