Funerals

That is funny!
I knew a person that made a last request of lowering their head so the coffin lid wouldn't touch their face. When asked why, they answered."I can't breathe with something toughing my mouth".Folks are folks, gotta luv um.

 

I think most of what we've got today goes back to the Christian idea of the Resurrection and the belief that you'd need all your bits & pieces then.

Of course, its been so long coming that those who started the custom are no more than dust now themselves, but old habits die hard [so to speak...]

The funeral business is just that - a business, so they're obviously going to encourage customs that mean more money for them.

By coincidence I was walking through a cemetery this morning [the shortest route to my dental appointment !] and was musing on all the old graves over 100 years old and generally in disrepair... all that money spent on ornate stonework, in many cases by people who could ill afford it... what good did it do anyone, dead or living ?

 

If that was true, then a murderer could completely destroy your body through burning or disposal at sea and prevent god from resurrecting you, making the murderer - in that one way - more powerful than god. That makes no sense at all. No one can prevent god from doing what he chooses, by any logic that I'm aware of.

Of course, I assume that you want all our bits and pieces for your little laboratory projects.

There is an old cemetery here where the old wealthy families have mausoleums, markers, statues, and so forth that are much more elaborate than those around them. But the people are all equally dead.

Most American cemeteries have special sections for small children and infants, where the plots are much smaller. At every holiday, you can count on seeing in these places all sorts of toys, balloons, and stuffed animals out there, being slowly destroyed by the weather. I'm sorry that these parents are so upset, but their child isn't ever going to know what was put out there for them. This behavior borders on the insane. Why not donate those items to charity? There are living children in poverty who could enjoy them.

I have my disagreements with the Moravian Church, but they've got at least one thing right. They keep their grave markers simple, and their rule is that all of them have to be exactly alike. In a Moriavian cemetery, there is no competition in death.

 

my husband tells me he wants a viking burial and insists i must build the raft myself...should be a good time


i agree with you though, its a total waste of money and resources....bare minimum will be enough for me, why should i care anyways, im not even there!

 

That's what it all comes down to, sadly. In fact I am surprised religions like Christianity don't opt for cremation. It's less fancy, less expensive and impressive looking, but aren't we all Gods children and equal anyways?

Just burn me, and scatter my ashes. I don't want a place where people can go to mourn my passing- I would much rather just be in someone's memories, where they can think positively about my life and not negatively about my death.

 

I've actually been avoiding this thread... about the same way I avoid funerals.

The last funeral I went to was a long time ago, for my grandmoter (my mother's mother).

Open casket...

I have no problems looking at dead bodies... but when people paint them up and dress them up like they are some sort of fucking doll... it can make me puke... literally...

I can't even imagine what goes through a persons head who thinks this is a good idea...

I just had two relatives pass away, both whom I cared about, one whom I considered dear to me... I didn't go see her as she was in a slipping in and out of a coma near the end, and I won't go to the funeral or memorial service. The grandmother that I loved, is floating around in my head with my other memories... Neither her at the end, nor her dead body in a box is who she was.

As for me... Burn me baby...

And I don't mean toss me in some fucking gas chamber and light it up...

build a huge bonfire in the middle of my garden, toss me on top and spark it up...
When the ashes cool, plow the damn garden and plant some pot.

There will be enough thc, caffiene and nicotine released into the atmosphere as I burn that everyone within 100 miles will be fucked for a week...

 

My relatives have all been cremated with no memorial (by their choice, not because we are cheapskates) and that is how I plan to do it as well.

I agree about the land issue... we are running out of land to live on, and it would be nice to have land to preserve as well. I don't want to take up any space that could be used for something else or just not used at all.

 

Although, I have to admit that I love walking around old cemeteries. There is a Victorian cemetery near my house and I love to look at all the old Mausoleums and tombstones. The whole setting is very beautiful and peaceful.

 

That's a very different point that I hadn't really considered. They do have a majestic quality which I for one am also very found of.

 

But do we need more of these?

I got something out of seeing Ben Franklin's grave in Philadelphia and walking around that old cemetery, but none of us are likely to be famous for generations to come.

 

Never said we needed anymore

Nah, as I initially stated, I don't like the idea of burial. They are pretty places, but if I had to choice between aesthetic and practicality- the latter wins.

And speak for yourself, it's only a matter of time before I become a worldwide sensation. You can become famous for all the wrong reasons as well you know

 

Its a religion...and one based on what a few desert tribes 4000 years thought were good ideas, at that.

It doesn't have to make sense.

 

Yeah, noticed one of those areas this morning. The custom here seems to be for those little windmill thingys that spin in the breeze, and I also noticed a few of those solar light-stick things that re-charge in the day and light up at dusk.

Just waiting for the strange lights in the cemetery stories to start circulating...

 

No shit. :coffee:

I was just asking.

And I can tell all my friends that I knew you back when you were a nobody.

 

I want to be taken up Mount Everest and left to freeze. That way I will be buried by the snow and hopefully not found for thousands of years.

 

Glad to know that I am not the only one

Yeah, we don't need anymore, but I can't help but like the ones we have. The only cemetery I have found to be really depressing was Arlington Cemetery.

 

In order for my spirit to depart and be free i must be cremated. Not buried, then it will take time to organize my visa for off worlding.
hmm.

 

I believe ANY kind of preservation of a corpse is not only unnecessary, it's hazardous.

If the laws weren't the way they were I would choose to simply be buried where ever was convenient without a casket or formaldehyde and left to rot as nature intended, but because our society likes to profit on something as natural as death even - I will be cremated.

 

my first job after high school,& quitting my parent's furniture refinishing shop was at a burial vault factory.the reason for the vault is to keep the embalming fluid from seeping into the ground theoretically.I agree death has become a massive industry,but most families like a memorial for a loved one,famous or not

 

i want my body to be burried naturally, in front of a tree with only hemp cloth around my body. i wan't it done by family too. but im only 16 and so i have a way to go