Now these sturdy bones were being brought into the morgue by the thousands. And it was up to us to identify them and send them on for further analysis. So after I had named whatever I could recognize, Mark or Mickey would write my description on the new bag, into which John or I would gently place the tissues in question. One of the other morgue workers — Audrey, Terry, or Vinnie — would carry the bag over to one of the pathologists, who had their own group at the other end of the morgue, close enough for us to work together but far enough to avoid DNA cross-contamination from the various body parts. The pathologists were technically in charge of the whole operation, but they worked as members of the team, assigning case numbers, dictating detailed descriptions of the remains, instructing Diana to take x-rays, Joe or Raoul to take fingerprints, or a dentist to analyze the teeth. They took the DNA samples themselves. Barbara, the Port Authority sergeant, was there, too, helping things to go smoothly.
Meanwhile, at my end of the morgue, I felt my way through the mangled remains, trying to come up with some bone or a recognizable bit of soft tissue to which I could give a name. I had the unmistakable sense of everything coming together again — the dissections I'd done in Georgia; the work in Texas, Tennessee, and Kentucky; the years of memorizing bone fragments in Dr. Bass's osteology class. Here I was using all of it — and the stakes had never been higher.
On and on I worked, my hands seeming to move of their own accord, my mind automatically naming and noticing and cataloguing. Every once in a while we'd get a body that was relatively intact, perhaps one that had been sheltered by fortuitous physics as the structures imploded. Somehow, the combination of kinetic forces had formed a few pockets that denied access to the pulverized concrete and debris. While the victims found here died just as suddenly as the others — their lives snuffed out quickly from the heat, lack of oxygen, and explosive pressures of the implosion — their bodies were not torn asunder and they could be returned in relatively recognizable shape to their grieving families, having been identified by standard means — dental records, fingerprints, and/or unique tattoos.
Mainly, though, we were working with fragmented and unassociated bones or body parts. But although we were moving at a relentless pace, the mood in the morgue wasn't tense — instead it was somber, almost reverent. Every single one of us was aware that the remains we handled were all that was left of somebody's loved one, that a fingertip or bone shard might be all that a family would have to mourn over and cherish after such a sudden loss of life.
Indeed, the remains we handled might well belong to someone that my triage team had known personally — one of John's Port Authority buddies, or a colleague of Mark's from the force. Usually, in a morgue, you have complete detatchment — the morgue workers are rarely acquainted with the people who have died, and that impersonality is as important to us as it is to a surgeon, who can make a healing incision on a stranger that he or she could never make on a parent, child, spouse, or friend. Yet even though in Kentucky we did occasionally work on people we knew, the far greater likelihood that my New York team could at any moment encounter a colleague or buddy created a sorrow that hung in the air as palpably as the smell of death. Every single one of us handled every single body part as though it had belonged to our own father or mother, our own child, brother, sister, or spouse. Each of us treated these shattered bits with respect — and maybe even with love.
Despite the very personal grief that these police officers felt, they worked with an unfailing commitment and caring that never failed to move me. They were there by my side the whole time, opening bags, transcribing the words I was using to describe the tissues: “right distal femur,” “left foot,” “portion of scapula.” At first I had to spell some of the technical terms I was using, but in spite of my southern drawl, they soon caught on to what I was saying, and since we were seeing so many of the same bones I no longer had to spell out m-a-n-u-b-r-i-u-m when I identified a fragment that had come from the top of someone's breastbone.
These guys not only helped me with the logistical problems of identifying and re-bagging the remains, they helped me stay focused. It was easy to get emotionally involved with the work — a piece of monogrammed jewelry around a neck or a name badge still pinned to a victim's shirt constantly drove home the fact that these weren't just shattered bodies, they were also shattered lives. We all did our jobs efficiently and with care, but sometimes the stress got to be too much and we had to stop, step outside the tent, and get some fresh air just to clear our heads.
When I started that first night, I was especially serious. After all, I was the new girl in town and I was well aware of how personally everyone took this work. And my trip to Ground Zero that afternoon had fired me with my own sense of reverence for the remains I handled. Hour after hour we focused on our jobs, with barely a superfluous word or unnecessary comment. I'm sure my team members wondered how they could stand to work with me for the next two weeks if this unbroken seriousness was all that was in store.
Then, right before midnight, something broke through the shell of the ultraprofessional demeanor I had assumed to cover my nervousness. Al opened up a small red biohazard bag containing a flat piece of mangled tissue. Gently, I teased it apart so that I could get a good look at it, dictating notes about the muscle mass and the little bit of white fat around the edge. But when I caught sight of the splinter of bone, I looked up from my delicate task, gazing at John, Mickey, and Al in turn.
And then I started to laugh.
Everyone was shocked. Being super-serious might not be acceptable, but laughing at a dead person's body part? What kind of monster was I?
I reached down, grabbed the piece of bone, and waved it in front of them. “It's a pork chop!”
There was a moment of silence. Then we all started to chuckle — quietly, so the pathologists on the other side of the room wouldn't think we had all gone crazy.
“How in the heck did that get in here?” I asked.
Mickey knew the answer. “There were restaurants in and around the Twin Towers. In fact, during the first day or two after the attack, we found part of a side of beef inside one of the body bags.”
I shook my head. “At least no one expects us to catalogue that.”
That wasn't the last time I encountered nonhuman tissue. Throughout my time in the morgue I managed to catch a good number of chicken bones, beef ribs, and even a few legs of lamb before they were given case numbers.
Other laughs were few and far between inside this morgue. The solemn care with which we tried to handle even the smallest fragment of tissue often threw a mantle of despair over us all, and when we got a respite between shipments of body parts, we would gather in the street or inside one of the adjacent tents or trailers and tell stories of life away from death. The cops from New York delighted in telling me about life in the Big Apple, and I, in turn, would reveal some of my adventures in the hills of Kentucky. They teased me about my accent and I made fun of theirs. I taught them how to say “y'all” with just the right inflection — and I couldn't wait to get back to Kentucky and greet folks with “How you DOin'?” just as my teammates taught me.
When I first started working at the morgue, I was continually amazed by the tent city that had sprung up around it, and by the generosity and creativity of the New Yorkers who were trying to show their support in any way they could. Just around the corner from us, the Salvation Army and numerous charitable organizations made sure we had a continuous supply of soft drinks, water, candy, and crackers, as well as hot meals three times a day. The Salvation Army canteen was staffed continually and offered not only good, nourishing food, but smiles and a touch of home. Their tables often had fresh flowers in little bud vases and notes from schoolchildren and other well-wishers taped to the walls. Someone had obviously put a lot of thought into the decorating scheme, because these notes were positioned throughout the makeshift dining hall, so that wherever you looked, you could see someone's message of hope or thanks.