The Grimms Wish You a Respectful Holiday Season. Remember their Motto: Waiting, Always Waiting for your Call.

A Respectful Holiday Greeting from the Grimms Family
Waiting, Always Waiting for your Call

The Grimms live on Mulberry Circle in Cloverdale. This is their Christmas Card photo for 2010. Try as they might, they couldn’t get little Albert to be as serious about the family picture as the rest of the family. After all, this was the photo to be sent to all their past and future clients. It required a look befitting their business.

“We don’t know where Albert came from,” said Horace Grimms, owner and director of Grimms’ Mortuary and Taxidermy, servicing the dearly departed in Clovershire for the last 54 years. “There is something different about that boy.”

Febee Grimms interjected her opinion about her youngest child. “I don’t think Albert will ever be able to help with the family business.” She paused for a moment and looked at her son and then into her husband’s sad eyes. “We were so hoping for a boy to pass the business on to when we retired. We have our son, but he’s not exactly cut out for the funeral business.”

Febee was correct. Albert’s sisters were well groomed for the funeral business, having learned at an early age to subdue feelings of joy and happiness. You see, the Grimms Funeral Parlor consists of the embalming plant, the chapel, the crematorium, the garage for their two hearses, and the family living quarters.

During viewings and funerals, the girls help with the flowers and the condolences book. They help at the doors and in the kitchen. When not helping their father and mother with a service, they are allowed to play but must keep their voices low and faces somber in case they are seen by the bereaved.

Albert, on the other hand, sees joy in everything around him. Once, during the funeral for the Widow Morris, Albert burst through the chapel doors to tell his mother that he’d caught a butterfly. Febee was mortified. She snatched him up with one arm and carried him from the chapel. She covered his face with her other arm to quiet his voice and conceal his smile. Many sitting in the pews were visibly shaken, knowing the Widow Morris despised children, having taught school for the better part of 40 years.

The Grimms are resigned to their fate, knowing the trails of raising a ‘special‘ child. They will continue to work with Albert, but realize he will never have the temperament to work with the dead.

Albert will be left to find his own way.