Terrified but undaunted: Funeral home, family serves its community
Around mid-January, the family that runs Abraham L. Green and Son Funeral Home in Fairfield began noticing news reports about a virus that was gripping a city in central China. Samuel and John Green, the son and grandson, respectively, of the funeral home’s founder, began talking to area funeral directors, as well as various health departments.
The news was troublesome, to say the least.
In late January, the U.S. reported its first confirmed COVID-19 case, a man who’d traveled to the Wuhan region, and then returned to Washington state. In late February, the U.S.’s first death from the virus was reported in Seattle. Researchers pinpointed an early March gathering, where about 50 people gathered for a 40th birthday party in a Westport home, as a super-spreading event. Meanwhile, Fairfield commuters took trains out of one of the town’s three railroad stations in to work in New York, and then they came home again.
The thought of wearing a mask or avoiding contact with friends was the stuff of dystopian novels.
But for people paying attention — epidemiologists, medical personnel, and funeral directors — reports about the coronavirus grew increasingly ominous. After one conversation with public health officials, said Jonathan Green, “we were sitting here looking at each other, saying, ‘This can’t be.’ ”
But then, within a week or two, he said, the virus was all the officials suggested and more. Some reports said overwhelmed funeral homes had to turn away families, but that didn’t happen at Green, which was founded by Abraham L. Green to provide for the area’s Jewish community. In an industry where it’s natural to draw close and comfort the grieving, the staff at Green took drastic steps to make sure their rituals would not spread the virus. They consider themselves, said Jonathan L. Green, the last of the first responders. They are also, as funeral directors, skilled at coping, but there was little time for that.
“We were terrified,” said Samuel A. Green. “We were all hoping and praying we didn’t bring anything home with us. It was a constant stress point.” For extra precaution, knowing people needed him healthy, he also quarantined anything that came into the house. Whatever the scientific efficacy of that, the extra precautions gave the family comfort.
“We are reading yesterday’s news,” he said. “It gives us a little peace and comfort that we’re doing everything we can.”
For the longest time, Fairfield County — with roughly a quarter of the state’s population — was home to more than half the state’s coronavirus cases.
Everything changed, said Jonathan Green. Protocol had to be rewritten, and then revised again. There was no option to shut down, not with an even greater need for services. Instead, mourning — as did education, and business — went virtual. All arrangements were made by phone or computer. Services were live-streamed.
The intensity those weeks required is a little bit ironic, considering Jonathan Green had no intention of joining the family business. During high school and breaks from college, he’d help out, but halfway through a graduate degree in social work, he realized he was happiest working with his family, and he called his father to tell him about his decision to join the business. The overlap between the profession he thought he’d enter and the one he’s in is not lost on him. There are crises, followed by comforting.
Here’s comforting: Scientists say we have succeeded in — who knew this was a thing? — flattening the curve (or quelling the spread of the virus) by observing social distancing, staying out of public spaces, and (for those who could do so) shrinking our worlds as much as possible to our homes. But the pandemic is not over, and Connecticut begins to ease restrictions and schools around the state plan for fall semesters, scientists warn of a second wave that could stress our health care system to the breaking point.
For now, though, business is quieter, said Jonathan Green. One of Gov. Ned Lamont’s recent executive orders eased some of the restrictions that had been placed on gatherings. The industry still suggests smaller graveside services, with the hope of holding larger memorial services when it’s safer. As the state emerges from its quarantine, the staff at Green is discussing concerns that people will forget the virus is still very much with us.
The ridiculous hours are easing. The sky is — slowly — clearing. Jonathan and his wife, Emily, have started an exhausting (and therapeutic) landscaping project. Maybe Samuel Green can have time to tinker with his car. Things are not normal yet, but on some days, it feels like you can see normal from here.