Shedding our self-obsession

Twelve of us stood around the grave of John Doe, laid to rest Thursday through the kindness of strangers. He was found dead last summer in the Spokane River.

John Doe – real name unknown, age unknown, next of kin unknown – died in a culture obsessed with being known. A culture where unprecedented personal information is available for public consumption. Did John Doe have a profile on MySpace? Did he ever dance a funny dance on YouTube?

Probably not. He didn’t even have fingerprints. The time he spent languishing in the river decomposed them. “In the six months before he died, John Doe had four teeth pulled,” said Lorrie Hegewald of the Spokane County medical examiner’s office. This is one of the few facts Hegewald knows about him, and she’d love to know more.

The culture of attention has been getting my attention lately. Anna Nicole Smith dying, Britney Spears shaving, Ann Coulter using the word “faggot” just to get press play. It’s making me crazy, even as I contribute to the problem by writing this public column about my personal thoughts.

I went to John Doe’s memorial service because the medical examiner’s office staffers who organized it tend to shy away from attention of any kind. They work with dead people – those who die suddenly or mysteriously. They figure out why. They notify family members.

Sally Aiken, medical examiner, stepped into the position in 2001. She followed a decade’s worth of coroner types who couldn’t stay out of the spotlight. One was obsessed with anal sex. Another was considered a brilliant eccentric or an incompetent fool, depending on whom you asked. A third resigned due to troubles with drugs and alcohol. Never heard of Aiken? She prefers it that way. Her office runs without much turmoil, without much publicity.

They did send out a press release about the plan to bury John Doe. They did it because they wanted to publicly thank some folks who donated time and services. Hennessey-Smith Funeral Home’s Mike Sanborn did the graveside service. Bitterroot Casket Co. donated John Doe’s casket. Spokane Professional Transport transported the body. Fairmount Memorial Park gave a steep discount on the cemetery plot.

They also hoped that community members, and the media, might find their way to the service. But the crowd did not overwhelm. Medical examiner staffers were there, as well as law-enforcement chaplains Ronald Alter and John Thompson. One anonymous person dropped off a plant at the cemetery office. The plant was placed atop the casket. One lone cameraman from KXLY filmed an interview with Hegewald about her hope of identifying John Doe, the casket in the background.

It was a beautiful service, nonetheless. It lasted 10 minutes. Even the Gospel reading was brief, Luke 23:44-46. It was now around midday, and darkness came over the whole land until midafternoon with an eclipse of the sun. The curtain in the sanctuary was torn in two. Jesus uttered a loud cry and said, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” After he said this, he died.

Newsweek columnist Anna Quindlen believes that a backlash is growing against attention-hungry media commentators who name-call to draw attention to themselves. “Like doo-wop when the Beatles showed up, an era is grinding to a close.”

I hope she’s right, because I believe that the things we should be paying attention to will not announce themselves in flashy ways. No shaving of the head, no saying of the “F” words. They will make themselves known in softer gestures.

The medical examiner’s staff buried John Doe because “we could do this,” Aiken said. It was that simple, that poignant, that refreshing.