literary response

Performing a public service as vital as it is gruesome, Sandra is one of Australia’s unofficial experts on the living aspects of death.

(The secret life of crime.) http://narrative.ly/cops-robbers/the-secret-life-of-a-crime-scene-cleaner/

This story was an excellent read, in my oppinion. The tittle alone was the first thing that captured me. This interview was on a woman named Sandra Pankhurst. Sandra is a transgender female who owns her own clean up company, not just ordinary house clean up but the kind of clean up we usually don’t think of when we see ads for services .Sandra cleans up crime scenes, deceased resident’s estates, houses where hoarders have overflowed with clutter and garbage for years. The job is very grueling and strenuous mentally and psychically.

“Sandra is one of Australia’s unofficial experts on the living aspects of death.”

This story was amazing to me because even though the jobs were gruesome, Sandra’s personality is so empathetic and sincere it brings admiralty to her job. As we read on Sandra’s story starts to show through the interviewer’s questions, Sandra states that she experienced a brutal and harsh childhood, consisting of starvation and random beatings, It makes you wonder if that is how she ended up in this field

“People do not understand about body fluids,” the brochure reads. “Bodily fluids are like acids. They have all the same enzymes that break down our food. When these powerful enzymes come into contact with furnishing and the like, deterioration is rapid.

, “It was like an imprisonment sort of lifestyle. So hence, now I have this need for compassion,” she says.

What made this piece so great was how the author gives such great detail to the surrounding areas of where the jobs where taking place, it made you feel like we were working the job with her and we could almost smell the ambiance she described. she explains that she no longer wheres the same outfits as her crew  to be more  respectful to the family's  in these situations.

“It’s because I’m meeting someone there — quite often a family member — I don’t want them to go into shock, like this person from out of space has come here. I grin and bear it and I go in.”I ask her how she maintains that level of compassion.

“Everyone deserves it — because I deserve it as well,” she says.

In her response I can feel the amount of compassion she has and it really makes you thankful that there are people like her to take care of business we could never fathom doing.