I braced myself as the first body was uncovered, a male that had been decomposing on the dirt for about a month. There were maggots and flies everywhere. At this point, all the flesh on his body had nearly liquefied into brownish-grey ooze. The maggots fed off the bacteria on the flesh aiding in faster decomposition. The stench of this rotting flesh is something that will never leave my memory. It's like a cross between vomit and spoiled fruit - there is an oddly "sweet" smell to death.

While watching our interview subject explain the intricacies of decomposing bodies and bugs, I noticed all the flies swarming around me. Swatting them away from me, I couldn't help but think about the fact that they were all probably swimming around in decomposing flesh and leaving the residue on my skin.

I saw more bodies uncovered, and more stages of decomposition. Some were just skeletal remains with no identifiable characteristics. One body I saw was faced down with its head turned toward me. I noticed a facial expression that looked like it was yelling. This probably wasn't intentional and merely the facial muscles contorting while breaking down.

On day two, we got up close and personal with some of the maggots. While filming close-ups of the bodies you could hear the insects squishing around loudly. Anna Fitch, our esteemed producer, has a background in entomology so the sight of this many bugs feeding didn't seem to cause her much discomfort. At one point she found a big black beetle in the pool of maggots devouring a body. Excitedly, she reached her hand inside the rib cage of the decomposed subject we were filming and into the mush to retrieve the beetle for the camera. It kept going back into the pool and she kept swimming her rubber-gloved hand through it to find the rogue beetle and get the shot she wanted. This happened over several takes and the sound guy and I nearly lost our lunches over it.

I also saw a body uncovered that was not very decomposed, even though it had been lying there for a month. Apparently when the body is heavily medicated before death, the drugs act as somewhat of a preservative keeping the body from breaking down. The bugs barely touched this one.

Before going to the Body Farm, I had seen dead bodies before. The morbid subject matter of this show has allowed me to see things I probably would never get the opportunity to see, such as an autopsy. In the end, I've taken something very positive from these experiences: they have allowed me to confront the reality of death, something I admit I have ignored, probably out of fear. While the morgue was a clinical view of death, the Body Farm showed me what happens to a body when nature takes its course. After seeing the various faces of death and smelling the liquefied remains I've come to the conclusion that I'd like to be cremated when I die.