by Dudley Clendinen

About the author: Dudley Clendinen is a former national correspondent for the New York Times.

My cousin Florence Hosch finally died the Wednesday before Christmas 1995, about a thousand days after she had wished to.

Her Christmas card, mailed from the nursing home in Dunedin, Fla., came the following Tuesday. Florence herself didn’t arrive for almost a month, but I knew she was en route.

A Death Delayed

After three years of hospitals, nursing homes, doctors, social workers, lawyers, accountants and real estate agents, the last employee of the last enterprise in charge of her long and exhausting death telephoned to say that it was over. “Hi, this is American Burial and Cremation calling, just to let you know that the cremains for Florence Hosch are being...