Naomi Girson | opinions editor

It’s 3 a.m. on Christmas morning and the phone rings. Someone is dead. Their family and friends now have to plan a funeral, but who is going to answer the call?

“You’re going to miss your children opening the gifts, and you’re going to miss grandma’s pie. But that’s the deal you signed up for, and so every single day is different,” said Michael Burns, a certified funeral director and the dean of students at Pittsburgh Institute of Mortuary Science (PIMS).

At PIMS, they teach budding funeral directors about the field and the sacrifices they have to make to be successful in the career.

The school, located in Shadyside, opened in 1939, according to the PIMS website.

The population size of PIMS is small, with roughly 400 students enrolled, according to PIMS president Barry Lease. But, he appreciates what a small class size means for the quality of lessons.

Nick Ricci, who graduated from Duquesne business school in 2014, attended PIMS after getting his bachelor’s degree in business administration, finance and accounting.

He wanted to get involved in the funeral business because of his great-grandfather, who was a funeral director, and Ricci even worked at a funeral home himself in high school. But, Ricci took the safe route and went to college.

After college, he went back to his passion and completed school at PIMS where he is now a teacher.

“I love all the students that come through the school and being able to get to know them really well,” Ricci said. “In regards to the funeral profession, it’s one of the world’s oldest professions and one of the most dignified professions that exists.”

While dignified, Burns said the career is not always easy and that funeral directors must stay grounded in their work.

“These [people] are going back to someone’s family, and so we concentrate on the survivors. It’s a real clinical thing, and it’s working on the deceased body, but all of our focus is on their family … and that takes away a whole lot of the toughness to see what we do see,” Burns said.

John Elachko, who graduated from Duquesne in 2002, studied psychology, sociology and communications. He now teaches at PIMS and owns his own funeral home, but admitted funeral directing isn’t for everyone.

“I don’t think they are all fit for this career, there’s a select few,” Elachko said. “They don’t know how to give themselves up for other people, it’s not something you can teach.”

For most, involvement in the industry started with custodial tasks like cleaning hearses and raking leaves. Lease said these small tasks are just as important as any other.

Even now, the faculty still shovel the snow themselves in front of the school in the winter.

Lease said they have to think about what the dead’s loved ones deserve to see.

“They didn’t come in in a good mood. They didn’t want to be in that place,” Lease said. “And so you damn well better have all the creature comforts that they need and they expect.”

The building is versatile and houses a plethora of resources, including an art restoration lab, a practice showroom and an auditorium for live embalming. Students also have access to a therapy dog who is being trained to offer support in times of grief.

In the art restoration lab, students restore silicone busts by using wax and other materials used on real bodies. The busts have the actual feel of embalmed tissue, giving students the most authentic experience possible.

Since every person is different, Ricci said every embalming and restoration is different, too. In some cases, the traumatic injuries to a person might be beyond full restoration, but he said anything the funeral director can do for them leaves the person better off than before.

To embalm a body, they always begin with a moment of silence in the room. Each body is handled with care. They are given a full bath, a hair wash and have their exposed areas covered in order to preserve the body’s dignity in its final moments above ground.

The bodies are then embalmed, bathed once more and then put in a body bag to go back to the funeral home.

They do almost 800 embalmings a year at PIMS alone, with some being done for education and others for local funeral homes, according to Burns. The constant cycle of life and death can take a toll, but Burns said they have to focus on the survivors and those waiting for the funeral, which will be the last time that a family see their loved one.

“Look at your hands. These hands are going to be the last hands to touch this life that is moving from presence to memory. Do it respectfully,” Lease said.

Naomi Girson can be reached at girsonn@duq.edu