fuck thousands for a coffin. or hundreds for an urn. can i legally be burried in butcher paper?
can i donate my body to science and skip burrial all together?
i want my final action to be a big middle finger to the funeral industry picking on people in their weakest moments.
Among the other warnings here, if getting the cremains is important to you, be careful; my mother did this and we never got anything back. We almost didn’t get anything of my father back, but my sister was tenacious.
I don’t understand why people care. My dad is gone. I can’t get help fixing my roof from his urn. Some people do talk to the remains of their loved ones, but they can’t hold a conversation so I have never seen the point.
Sure, I mostly agree with you, but some people do care. As such I just wanted to offer this warning.
However, I do have the cremains for my dogs and my dad on a small, out of the way shelf in my living room. In my more down moments, it’s been comforting to think of them as “there” even though I know they’re not. Also it can be a focal point when I’m putting effort into remembering them. Finally, I have a young kid; having a physical object to point at helps with explaining death to them in gentler terms.
In the Netherlands you don’t even get the cremains back. I have no idea where most of my dead relatives are. In Germany you get them back, but you must bury them. Putting them on the mantlepiece is not an option.
Fair enough, and perhaps not unreasonable. I know a lot of people want to spread them out, which I think is fine in a private area but at best debatable in a public area and definitely not in a protected area.
Grief is powerful and wild.
Just so you’re aware, it’s my understanding that during cremation you’re likely getting first only some of the remains back and second likely not only theirs. I don’t think it matters, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the remains of your father was some other ashes entirely. It doesn’t really matter though. It’s just a bunch of carbon at the end of the day.