Where does your body go after death

[357 MAX]

I don't think cremation is all that expensive.

First of all, you need to leave instructions. Even then, there is no guarantee that they will be followed. If you are a thoughtful person, you will make financial arrangements in advance. Or leave enough money behind so that those with instructions can do the job as you have chosen.

Choosing cremation doesn't require purchase of a permanent repository; you can have your executor scatter or leave them anywhere. Located in a city where I used to work (but not for), there was a filled-up cemetery that had been deeded over to the municipality. There was no more money to be made from burials, so the property defaulted to the city and they took it over. Basically, it meant mowing the lawn. So one time, they got a package in the mail addressed to X City Cemetery. It had been mailed from Alaska; the decedent had left instructions that he wanted to be buried in X City Cemetery. His attorney or executor had mailed his cremated remains to this city. Who turned it over to their parks department, who in turn simply dumped the ashes in a flower bed, as burials were no longer being done.

Mrs. Merkt, a Roman Catholic, wants burial in a Catholic cemetery. I don't really care, so I went along with her wishes. I got her to agree to cremation, formerly a big no-no for hard core Catholics but it's now accepted (if frowned upon by some). We bought a little niche in this cemetery for the urns to be placed. No expensive "land" to purchase, no expensive embalming, etc., no expensive caskets, no expensive digging. It's bought and paid for, so it won't be an expense for our children.

Your instructions need to be left with a responsible person. A cousin of my mother never had children. Her husband died first and she was widowed, so had no close relatives to take care of "final arrangements." This chore fell to some younger guy the husband had worked with, "he was like a son." Right. Anyway, when this woman died, this guy had her buried (the plot was pre-paid). The guy was also the beneficiary of her will, and he never paid for a headstone to mark her grave. I guess he didn't want to cut into his inherited money to pay for it.

my late brother died in the veterans Hospitol in Salt Lake city, the VA creamated him.

 

[357 MAX]

At 56 my daughter and I have an agreement that my ashes are to be buried in a generic pringles can. I have made it very clear that I DO NOT want her wasting money on some over priced fancy REAL pringles can when a generic dollar store version will do the job just as well!

i'm thinking a Folgers can

 

[357 MAX]

All of it. From all of us. We are all killing the planet technically.
Im just saying feeding the fish our deceased pales in comparison to the toxic garbage we pollute the Earth with.

and where does all that toxic garbage come from? the toxic garbage planet?

 

[gmerkt]

my late brother died in the veterans Hospitol in Salt Lake city, the VA creamated him.

On family instructions or due to lack of them? I hadn't heard of the VA taking care of it.

The first place Mrs. Merkt and I lived in after being married in 1974 was a small, rented house. We rented from a somewhat older woman from Yugoslavia. She had retained some of the Old World ways and was a little weird. She had a young daughter, by their age relationship, could've been a grandchild but wasn't. The girl was really a daughter, the woman had her later in life. They lived behind our rented house in another small house.

Anyway, that was a long time ago. But the internet has given us an opportunity to snoop, if we want to. I looked this woman up. Three decades after we knew her, she died in a neighboring county. One of the internet entries for her was that her body was still in the county hospital morgue, unclaimed, after seven years. It's strange that her daughter wouldn't have claimed her and made "arrangements." Who can guess but that it was a relationship that had gone very sour.

 

[Mikej]

We had Wifey's mother in a box in various places pretty much since we got together in 1987. Her mom passed when she was in her tweens. In 2010 her dad passed and joined mother here at the house. Two and half, or so, years ago her bother, that had been brain damaged in a motor cycle crash when he was in his 20s, and in various foster care over the years, passed from liver cancer. We took all three of them on vacation with us in 2022. They're spending eternity in our favorite place in the world. Siltcoos Lake.

 

[DunRanull]

A late friend wanted "cremation after the third day" in line with some Buddhist (Nepalese/Tibetan) practice. He stated that many times. That's what his remains got.

 

[DunRanull]

At 56 my daughter and I have an agreement that my ashes are to be buried in a generic pringles can. I have made it very clear that I DO NOT want her wasting money on some over priced fancy REAL pringles can when a generic dollar store version will do the job just as well!

She may need to buy at least three Pringles cans- have you ever seen how much ash and small bone chips are produced by one human body? I have, several times- You will need at least one very large coffee can to take all your ashes.

 

[DunRanull]

My Plan is thus: cremation after the third day, and then- shot into space and released loose (not enclosed in a can). The open particles will float freely in space and become one with the cosmos. My disembodied Self will roam across the Universe...
THERE! THAT should foil any plans for a Resurrection!

 

[Andy54Hawken]

If you are going to be cremated....
Have one of your buddies stuff yer pockets with firecrackers , M80's , Roman Candles...

I told my wife I wanted to be cremated...she made an appointment for me , next Wednesday...
Andy

 

[Capn Jack]

When I was a kid the people nextdoor had their son's ashes in an urn on their mantle.
He had been a pilot and had been killed in Korea.

 

[DunRanull]

If you are going to be cremated....
Have one of your buddies stuff yer pockets with firecrackers , M80's , Roman Candles...

I told my wife I wanted to be cremated...she made an appointment for me , next Wednesday...
Andy

 

[Andy54Hawken]

Good book*...okay movie...lousy dinner choice....
Andy

* Make Room Make Room, Harry Harrison.

 

[Hawaiian]

When I was a little kid my parakeet died and I buried it in the back yard. A few weeks later I dug it up for some unknown reason. It grossed me out with worms crawling all over it having a feast. I decided right then and there that no way was I going to be buried in the ground and eaten by worms. I am to be cremated and the wife and son can do whatever they want with my ashes. I told them I'll be dead and won't know what they did with them so I don't care.

 

[Yarome]

A late friend wanted "cremation after the third day" in line with some Buddhist (Nepalese/Tibetan) practice. He stated that many times. That's what his remains got.

Yeah. Some Buddhist sects believe life ends with the last breath, but others believe there is a period of time after the last breath that your soul remains lingering between this life and the next. Disturbing the body before the spirit has time to transition to the next is taboo. The 3 day thing is a minimum amount and some will keep the body of their loved ones in the home for weeks or even up to 49 days if they had lived a troubled life. Positioning the body with the head facing North, a candle and incense at their head to guide their soul in the right direction and have food and drink nearby to sustain their spirits during the transition.

Shinto, Buddhist, Hindu... among others... it is common practice to keep your loved ones body at home for several days prior to cremation.

I have to say. Coming from a culture where cremation is the "rule".... sticking loved ones bodies in a metal box to putrefy and desiccate seems incredibly strange and almost disrespectful. Ya Heathens!!

Just sayin.... rituals and beliefs surrounding the handling of remains of a dearly departed varies wildly.

 

[Yarome]

I told my wife I wanted to be cremated...she made an appointment for me , next Wednesday...
Andy

Keep the spark in your marriage and call it "date night"?

 

[TTSX]

My most realistic answer is I'll die alone on the cold hard floor and nobody will come check until I stop showing up for work and paying my bills so the house gets repossessed. They'll have to scrape me off the floor with a spatula and try to explain away the mysterious stain in the hardwood as "patina"

Maybe after that I'll end up in a corner of a highschool classroom as one of those weird skeleton thingies the teachers dress up for the holidays because nobody's knows what to do with em. But they're "sciency"

 

[64MercurysRule]

Mrs. Teflon suggests donating one's remains to science for research or harvesting viable organs. But they'd still incinerate the remaining carcass. OP doesn't want "an expensive funeral or cremation." Would a relatively cheap burial be satisfactory? BTW, families of military veterans are routinely reimbursed for reasonable expenses.

Oh ...... Like the Imposter President O'biden who has already donated his current brain to science or better known as Dim o rat National Partially .

 

[teflon6string]

Oh ...... Like the Imposter President O'biden who has already donated his current brain to science or better known as Dim o rat National Partially .

I'd dump that out like a dirty ashtray and throw the container in the trash.

No such inflated-ego hubris here. Mrs. Teflon and I have agreed to sprinkle the "winner's" ashes into Falls Creek (Gifford Pinchot Forest) to commemorate skinny dipping in a pool at the falls on our 3rd or 4th date. I guess that's for whomever goes first. Unless we leave specific instructions for the "kids" to play along, the runner up will reside under a fern by a river somewhere in the woods. Back where we enjoy going.

Falls Creek Falls circa 2002, yours truly in the middle.

 

[gmerkt]

She may need to buy at least three Pringles cans- have you ever seen how much ash and small bone chips are produced by one human body? I have, several times- You will need at least one very large coffee can to take all your ashes.

Yes, I wonder about the volume of ash created from a human cremation. It seems to me that most of the urns I've seen would be unable to hold the entire load. Like the larger bone fragments that don't fully combust. So do the cremationists cheat a little, and only fill as much as the urn will take and dispose of the overflow otherwise?

 

[Camelfilter]

Yes, I wonder about the volume of ash created from a human cremation. It seems to me that most of the urns I've seen would be unable to hold the entire load. Like the larger bone fragments that don't fully combust. So do the cremationists cheat a little, and only fill as much as the urn will take and dispose of the overflow otherwise?

Repositioning, crushing etc. etc. All things I don't need to know, so don't have such parked well in my brain.

Much respect though for the many folks who deal with such as their careers / calling in life…

Whereas folks in health care see much tragedy & end of life, many also see the joys & happiness, if not "just" comfort.