Elizabeth Fournier | All Men Are Cremated Equal

September 13, 2009

Dr. Kent: Welcome back to Sound Authors. It’s a beautiful day out here in New York. The sun is shining finally, and summer appears to have almost arrived, and that’s a good thing, because in two days it really does arrive. Well, my next guest on the show, Elizabeth Fournier, she has a great book called All Men Are Cremated Equal: My 77 Blind Dates. It’s a crass title and it’ll be fun to chat with her about the book. Welcome to the show, Elizabeth Fournier.

Elizabeth Fournier: Hi there, Dr. Kent.

Dr. Kent: Tell me about this book. It’s pretty off the wall, your title.

Elizabeth Fournier: Yeah, it’s actually a real life story. And of course, how I got the title is I live it every day. I am a mortician, so I in fact know that all men are cremated equal. And of course, blind dates, well, you know. Ladies will probably concur, in general, if it doesn’t work out, we can cremate them equally, too.

Dr. Kent: And it’s such a clever title. So tell us about, how is it as a woman of the industry of the funerary industry, I guess you call it. How is it being a woman in that industry?

Elizabeth Fournier: You know, it’s kind of a mixed bag because women are the natural caregivers. We’re the first undertakers, so to speak, the first layers out of the dead. So it’s very natural for us to be kind and caring and compassionate. However, once it became formalized with education, men came in because only men could go to school and go on and get the licenses and what have you. So it’s kind of a male dominated industry. There’s definitely a lot more men in it than women, and when people come to my funeral home on a daily basis to see me, they always say, “Oh, you’re the funeral director?” Or, “Oh, I didn’t think you were what a mortician looked like.” So I get a lot of that surprise. People think I’m the secretary or the girl answering the door or what have you. So that’s just a natural thing. And being in the industry as a woman is fantastic. I get to actually be myself and be there for people and love them and care for them. It’s perfect.

Dr. Kent: So have you ever had someone try to pick you up at the funeral home?

Elizabeth Fournier: Oh, I would say not so much because it was the excitement of being at a funeral home, but I’ve definitely been at funerals, or I’ve been at the cemetery at a burial and somebody, not of course the person who lost their spouse or whoever, but somebody a little bit further removed there, a friend of the family or somebody will kind of come up and ask me some questions about what I’m doing and how I got to be there and where I live. You know, you can tell if it’s interest or if it’s interest. You know, there’s kind of different things. Yeah.

Dr. Kent: Right. Well, so ok, so the book is about a blind dating spree, 77 blind dates. Now this really happened?

Elizabeth Fournier: Oh, yeah. It was one tiresome year of my life.

Dr. Kent: 77. I mean, that’s unbelievable. There had to be one good guy in that group.

Elizabeth Fournier: Well, they all were great. They really were fine, quality people, they just weren’t for me. And it’s not that I’m necessarily horribly picky, they just, they just weren’t for me.

Dr. Kent: And so talk about the book. You’ve got this book, and what do people think when they pick it up? First of all, it’s great as a gag gift, All Men Are Cremated Equal. Any woman can give that to her husband. But the book, what’s it about? It’s about your life as, in this industry that’s not common for women to necessarily be in, and then you’ve got these 77 blind dates, which seems like a big number, although it probably isn’t if you’re really looking for somebody that you click with.

Elizabeth Fournier: Yeah, exactly. The book is about my struggle looking for Mr. Right. I was 36 years old, I just left a fiancé, and I wanted to get married. I didn’t want another date. But when I had left a fiancé all the friends jumped up and down for joy and said, “Oh that’s great, I’m glad you left him, we’ve got a better candidate for you.” So everybody just, as soon as I had mentioned that it was over, they were showing up with the new great person, emailing me pictures and calling me and wanting my phone number to pass on to people, and I said, “You know, I appreciate, it’s a wonderful attention, but here’s the delio: I don’t want to have yet another relationship. I really, really, really want to find one.” So I wrote a list of ten things very important to me, passed that around to every co-worker, relative, neighbor, friend, whoever wanted to set me up with that great guy, and I said go with this list, that’ll work great. So the book was written to inspire women. Write a list, know what you want, he’s out there, you just have to know what you’re looking for.

Dr. Kent: And what was on your list?

Elizabeth Fournier: Very non-superficial things there, Dr. Kent. They were just common things that we don’t always thin about that holds relationships together. Such as, somebody who likes to spend time with their family. Somebody who wants to get to know my family. Somebody who can make me laugh. How about this one, somebody who owns a set of tools. I mean, they’re just really some basic, common things we don’t always think about, but not everybody possesses these really simple items.

Dr. Kent: And tell us a little bit about how you came to write this book. It’s a fun story, and honestly, how did you come to this industry, and how did you come to the place of wanting the 77 blind dates? I’m curious, and I think every reader of course will be curious, and that’s why they’ll read the book.

Elizabeth Fournier: Oh sure. Well, I wanted to get married. So I thought I’ve got to go on dates to get married, that’s how you do it. And rather than go the traditional route, I figured set me up. So that worked great, that went along well. As I was going on these dates I would call my father who I’m very close to and say, “Ok, Dad, I got a live one, and we’re going to do this, and here’s the rundown sketch. This is his name, where he lives, you know, this is the book he’s reading, what have you.” And then about an hour or two after the date I’d come back to my computer and email kind of the happenings of what happened, the goofy things the guy said, the reason why it’s not going to work, why it’s just a kibosh on the idea of the second date, and this happened on and on and on. And my dad was taking notes on this, and he said this is really incredible. You know, you should really write a journal. This is some really good stuff. After a while he said, “Wow, I hope you’re writing this journal cause this is great, you should share this with your girlfriends, this is some great insight, this really could save them a lot of headache, and you could pass this on to your male friends. They could really take a look at it and see what issues and problems they’re having with their dating life.” And so, after I wrote all this, my father finally said, “You know what, you know ok, you found the guy, you have all these wonderful notes of these guys that you dated, you need to write a book because this is phenomenal stuff. You need to get this out here.” He said, “Look, I’m 70 years old, and I’m completely engrossed in this, enmeshed in it, it’s exciting for me, it’s fun. Just think about a woman who’s your age, how much enjoyment and entertainment and education she’ll be getting out of it.” So I thought hey, you know, the guy is always right. So he really is, so I went with it, and I’m really glad I did.

Dr. Kent: Well, and you’ve got what, 17 five-star ratings on Amazon, so I think people enjoy the book. What kind of things can we expect inside this book? Are there crazy stories and funny events? What’s in there? I mean, just the situation itself lends itself to a blockbuster movie, you know, 77 dates and a woman who’s a mortician. It’s just something we don’t think about very often. But what’s in the book?

Elizabeth Fournier: Yeah, there’s definitely a lot of chatting about my job, what I do. There’s times in between the dates where I’m actually hanging out with my girlfriends, hanging out alone, I’m at work, whatever, and I also write about that, too, in first person, and talk about my experiences in the funeral industry. And I give a lot of insight and education as far as what that goes. What’s it like working in a funeral home and working in a cemetery on a daily basis. So a lot of that information is there, and what do funeral directors do for fun, and I talk about my own friends and what have you. But there’s a lot of funny experiences with the guys. A lot of just bad behavior on the part of men. And it’s just ironic bad behavior, men who feel the need to continually pick up a cell phone or text people constantly. That goes on quite a bit. A lot of stories of men who just were extreme characters, and did just wacky stuff. Some who were, you know, in costume or some who just kept rambling and repeating things. Some who…

Dr. Kent: In costume?

Elizabeth Fournier: Yeah, I had one guy who was a huge fan of Harry Potter. Harry, that’s all we heard about, that’s all we talked about. I appreciated his passion for it, but he did kind of have the maturity of a 12 year old, so I was going to have to pass on that one, but nonetheless, nice man, very entertaining, I absolutely enjoyed the two-hour date. And you know what…

Dr. Kent: Were they all sorts of fellows, from old to young?

Elizabeth Fournier: Um, no, they pretty much were in the age range of…

Dr. Kent: The 30’s?

Elizabeth Fournier: …mine. Yeah. I would say probably 30’s, 40’s, because I was looking for somebody who wanted to get married and wanted to have a child, pretty much in the very near future. So these were all candidates, so to speak, who were in that age range. All my friends went and scanned people and said, “Ok, I’ve got this great friend of mine, and she’s a mortician, and you know, she’s blonde,” whatever they wanted to say to run down my list of attributes, and then they would say, “Well, here’s the deal, this is what she wants.” And I think a lot of them, rather than holding the list up and saying, “Ok, can you answer yes or no to these questions?” they would just take a look at some co-worker, or somebody that they were thinking, “Hmm, I wonder if Elizabeth would like him?” and they mentally would go through the list and go, “Yeah, well, I guess he does do a lot of jobs and you know, I guess yeah, he does talk a lot about how much he can’t stand his family, and ok, forget that.” So I think that’s kind of how that worked out. I don’t think there was ever the clipboard in hand and the checklist.

Dr. Kent: Did you ever get back at your friend who set you up with the Harry Potter fellow?

Elizabeth Fournier: Well, you know, this is something that I think a lot of people who have been out blind dating have noticed. I think sometimes we think, “What were my friends thinking? Do my friends really know me?” I mean, obviously it’s somebody who knows both parties, and a lot of people think, “Oh yeah, you know, you’re both single, you’re both the same age, oh yeah, of course, of course she’ll get along.” So I was thankful to have the pre-screening because I think the setups would have been a heck of a lot worse. If I was just open to anybody, I definitely would have not met my goal. I would have probably got just any random guy who came along who my friends thought were cute, and that just wouldn’t have done it. I wanted all the pre-screening done ahead of time cause I didn’t want to get in a relationship with somebody who I thought was great and find out five months down the road, you know, they don’t believe in God, or find out that yeah, well they do have this habit that they do on a daily basis that I wasn’t aware of, that they concealed from me. I really just wanted all the meat and potatoes of the situation to be unveiled up front before I even met them, and then if he didn’t have any of these hang-ups then we could actually see, do we have chemistry? Do we actually have the same humor? Do we enjoy each other? And really, just in case, do we want to hang out?

Dr. Kent: And were there some close calls in those 77 dates?

Elizabeth Fournier: Yes, there were some close calls. There were some guys that I thought you know, yeah. I was matching up my first name with his last name, and I started, and I was texting the friend, and I was thinking this is great. But there was always some humdinger. There was always something that he did or said, and sometimes it can be as little as the wonderful political candidate who was just gorgeous, and he smelled good, and was charming, and we were at this wonderful event. And I saw my whole life unveil with him. But at the very end of our date he just made a comment that he hasn’t been in a relationship for years, and he doesn’t see himself getting married for years because he wants to go through the whole political foray, and I just had to think to myself, you know, that just wouldn’t work for me. That just wouldn’t work. So I had to say goodbye, and I’m just so thankful I did.

Dr. Kent: Yep, yep. Well, it’s been an honor chatting with you about this book. One thing I’ll say in closing here, I like that you’ve kind of confronted both things that I find most awkward in the world, and I think most people would. Blind dates are really awkward, and so are funerals.

Elizabeth Fournier: (laughter) Yeah, that’s a great, yeah, that’s a great way to tie that all together. You bet, and I try to, everybody I got to know I try to you know, break the stereotype and let them know hey, I’m a nice, fun, kind person, but just doing a job out there. It doesn’t have to be so scary, it can actually be tangible. And blind dating, you bet. What an arduous bag of tricks. And I’ll tell you what, I don’t recommend it for everybody.

Dr. Kent: Well, it’s been an honor chatting with Elizabeth Fournier, her book is called All Men Are Cremated Equal: My 77 Blind Dates, and it’s available on amazon.com and Barnes and Noble, and a bunch of other places it looks like.

Elizabeth Fournier: Thank you so much, Dr. Kent.

Dr. Kent: Yep, and my next guest on the show is another author, and she has written a book called Wake Up Women – Be Happy, Healthy & Wealthy. And I’ll talk to Shann Vander Leek in just a minute. Come on back for that.

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