Overheard in a conversation, “I just lost my husband.”(How could you lose someone that big and ugly?). How about this one? “My wife passed.”(Passed what? An 18 wheeler on Interstate 20?). Here’s one more: “My husband is no longer with us.” (Well, where the hell is he? You had him last.) We think of all sorts of cute and clever ways to acknowledge the fact of DEATH or DEAD, without actually saying the words; as if to say them would admit that they are indeed, truly DEAD.
“She has joined the unliving.” Is a softer way of saying she’s DEAD. Imagine a clock face with one hour representing a person’s life. He/she is born at 12:01 and will die at 12:59; that’s it, that’s how it works, the Circle of Life. No refunds or exchanges; make sure your trays are in the upright and locked position; we hope you enjoyed your one-hour flight! There’s no getting around the finality of DEATH; it is the final absolute; it’s what we refer to as a done deal!
There are many of us who still prefer to tiptoe around the big D word’s. For all those knuckle dragging, couch potato, man cave sports enthusiasts, there are some dandy metaphors. He was “ejected from the game”, “out at the plate,” “didn’t make the cut”, salary cap victim”, “signed his last autograph.” For all the earth huggers and gardeners, we submit, “She bit the dust”, “He’s pushing up daisies”, “He’s on the wrong side of the grass”, “and she’s in a pine box”. Finally, for the retail world, the DEAD acquire the persona of merchandise. For example, “he was discontinued”; “her barcode expired”; “his pull date came and went”, and finally “she was subject to a manufacturer’s recall”.
We cannot ignore the classics that have endured over time to become part of the American vernacular. “He kicked the bucket”; “she gave up the ghost”; “he called it a day”; she’s folded her tent for the last time”.
There you have it! We have just scratched the surface of all the cute and clever ways we can refer to someone who is DEAD.