INUVIK - By day, Mike Carruthers works a government job. After hours, he often finds himself in the morgue.

This year marks a decade since Carruthers became the owner of Inuvik Funeral Services and entered into a line of work nearly impossible for him to enjoy.

Mike Carruthers has been the owner of Inuvik Funeral Services for 10 years. - NNSL file photo

Before the previous owner left town in 1999, he approached Carruthers, a heating engineer for the department of public works.

"Just out of the blue, he asked me, he says, 'do you want to buy my business?' And I said 'sure.'"

It was a done deal, complete with a 1971 Cadillac hearse. Though at first he didn't have any experience ordering coffins, dealing with grieving families or dressing dead bodies, he learned as he went along. Over the past 10 years, Carruthers has arranged about 100 funerals in Inuvik, dealt with police and coroners and shipped caskets to most of the surrounding communities as well as to the Sahtu region.

"Everybody knows me and when something happens they call me right away in regards to getting a casket," he said. "They call me up right away and say 'Mike, we don't know what to do. What can we do?' And I say, 'I'll look after everything for you. I'll get all the papers that you have to sign. Just let me look after it.' And this way here they don't have to worry, they don't have the stress about doing this and going someplace – I'll look after everything."

Organizing a funeral for someone he knew well is one of the worst parts of the job – and it's also what keeps him going.

"Yeah, it's hard," he said. "Especially the young people that I've seen growing up here and by accident they have passed away, you know, either by drowning or by self-inflicted wounds or motor vehicle accidents."

"But then when the loved ones come in and view the body and I'm there with them, I feel the heart and soul of the family, because the family knows me, I know the family and I know the loved one that has passed away."

He's learned a lot over the years – for instance, that a grave should be dug no earlier than three hours before a summer funeral to prevent the permafrost from melting and filling the bottom of the grave with water. And he's seen a lot, too – sights he tries to forget but will probably always remember.

"Self-inflicted wounds are the worst, you know, because you remember them," he said. "I don't have flashbacks, but for the time I am working there with that person the whole day, after hours, I do visualize what the person looks like."

"There's not too much to like" about the job, he said, but it's enough to know people trust him with the remains of their family members.

"What I like about it is that I'm doing a community service for these people and they come to me and ask me – they're trusting me to do this. So if I can make the family happy, that makes me feel good. If I can relieve most of their pain in regards to losing their loved one, that's good for me, too."